; 







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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

Shelf ....G.4rs3 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



TODHC FOLK'S LIBRARY OF AMERICAN BISTORI. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS 



By MARA L. PRATT 

'I 

AND 

ANNA TEMPLE LOVERING. 



- C/^^^/V^. 



ly-^c^y^ 



BOSTON : 
EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHING COMPANY. 

1892. 






Copyright 
By educational publishing company. 

1892. 



IIS[a"RODUCT:^IOTv[. 

To tell all, or even a greater part of the stories of a State so 
rich in legeudar}^ and historical lore as is Massachusetts, would be 
to write a gazetteer. Therefore we have chosen such as seem 
likely to be of most interest to children — and this little book is 
for children — and have omitted the great mass of facts and 
statistics that cluster about many important growing cities of the 
State. 

It is with pleasure that we make mention of our indebtedness 
to Mrs. Margaret Preston, for her courtesy in allowing us to in- 
clude " The First Thanksgiving Day," and " The Boys Redoubt," 
in our stories of the Commonwealth, and we would also make 
due acknowledgement for certain illustrations, kindly loaned by 

the Old Colony Railroad. 

The Authors. 



YOUNG FOLKS' LIBRARY 

OF 

AMERICAN ^ HISTORY, 

By MARA L. PRATT. 



American History Stories. Vol. I. 
American History Stories. Vol. II. 
American History Stories. Vol. III. 
American History Stories. Vol. IV. 
Columbus and DeSoto. 
The Great West. 
Stories of Massachusetts. 
Stories of New York (In Press). 



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CON TP ENTTS. 



Page 

Coming of the Northmen 7 

Settlement of Massachusetts ........ 13 

Settlers at Plymouth 17 

Some Leading Men of Ph-mouth Colony . . _. . . . 25 

Miles Standish 27 

First Proclamation of Miles Standish (Pof»i) .... 35 

Indian Troubles in the Early History of Massachusetts ... 39 

King Philip's War 43 

Massachusetts Bay Colony 46 

John Winthrop 49 

King's Chapel Burying Ground 55 

A Boston Witch Story 59 

Religious Persecution in Massachusetts 62 

Boston Tea Party 69 

Boston Massacre 73 

Benjamin Franklin 75 

Education in Early Boston 79 

Massachusetts Harbor 85 

The Boy's Redoubt (Poem) 91 

Charlestown 97 

Somerville — Burning of the Convent 105 

Old Powder-House 110 

Historic Chelsea 113 

Roxbury Pudding Stone 119 

Lexington . 123 

3 



CONTENTS. 



Old Concord " . 

Dunstable 

Sudbury .... 

" Witch of Wenliam " 

Salem .... 

Nathaniel HaAvthorne 

Med ford .... 

Natick .... 

Old Merry Mount 

Quincy .... 

DoAvn on the Cape 

The First Thanksgivinji- Day (Poem] 

Provincetown . 

Stories of Nantucket 

Among the Life-Savers 

Gloucester 

Marblehead 

Newburyport 

Birthplace of " Old Put " 

Ipswich .... 

Rivers of Massachusetts . 

A Group of Manufacturing Cities 

Haverhill 

Lynn .... 

Lowell, the City of Magic 

Worcester, the Heart of the Commonwealth 

Springfield and the United States Armory 

Mountains of Massachusetts 

Hoosac Tunnel 

Fort Massachusetts 

Destruction of Deerfleld 

Decrfteld's Daughter 

The Great Elm at Pittsfleld 

The Balanced Rock 

Lake Onota and its Legend (Poem) 



Page 

138 

142 

147 

153 

159 

175 

177 

185 

191 

194 

201 

210 

213 

219 

229 

233 

237- 

249 

258 

265 

272 

275 

278 

286 

296 

302 

308 

312 

315 

320 

326 

331 

338 

341 

345 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS, 



THE COMING OF THE NORTHMEN, 

You have all read so much and have been told so much 
about the discovery of America, of the appearance of its 
people, of the great, broad, woody country, that I hardly 
need ask you to remember that when the first explorers 
came to our Massachusetts' shore they stepped upon a 
rough, barren, uninhabited shore, and saw stretched out 
before them only the bare, sloping hills, and the rich, 
dense forests primeval. 

Just who these first visitors to the Massachusetts' shore 
were we can never be really sure ; for in those early days 
there were no books and no records kept of explorations 
and discoveries. All we have then to judge from to-day 



8 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

is what little may be gathered from tradition, or such relics 
as happened unwittingly to be left in the trail of these 
people to mark their presence. 

As far as we know, it seems probable that the shores 
of Massachusetts may have been visited even a thousand 
years ago by the Northmen or Norsemen, a people living 
in the very northern part of Europe, in the Scandinavian 
peninsula. 

These Norsemen were always great sailors and loved 
nothing so well as to sail a\Yay into the unknown seas, dis- 
cover new lands, or, if fortune so favored them, to bear 
down upon lands already in the possession of other people. 

In the traditions of the Norse Vikings, as these rovers 
over the sea are called, there is much to be heard about 
their early ancestors who sailed fiir out to the westward, 
beyond Iceland, beyond Greenland, to a great uninhabited 
shore that stretched for miles and miles to the north and to 
the south. 

And if you look upon the map and see how short a 
distance it is straight out to sea from Norway to Iceland, 
you will not think it at all improbable that having come as 
far as Iceland in their great proud vessels, they would push 
on a little farther to Greenland, and then a little farther 
still to the shores of America. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 9 

Our Massachusetts comes in for its part in the possible 
visit from these Norsemen, although it is all so vague and 
uncertain. There was at one time a belief that a certain 
brass breast-plate which was unearthed at Fall River must 
have belonojed to some one of these Norse Vikino^s. And 
at another time certain hieroglyphics upon a stone near 
Dighton were thought also to be those of the Norse people. 
It is rather doubtful though, for the breast-plate is strangely 
like those of certain American Indians, as also are the 
hieroglyphics. 

In the city of Boston, the capital of Massachusetts, 
there has been erected recently a statue of a Norse prince. 
Lief the Lucky, son of Erick the Red, who, according to 
Norse tradition, sailed to this land far to the west, pushed 
his way southward until he came to a warm, beautiful shore, 
sunny and bright, near which grew great vines of rich 
purple grapes. 

The story Lief the Lucky tells runs something like 
this : 

"We had landed on the sunny shore, and were resting 
there. One morning one of the crew came out from the 
forests rolling his eyes, waving his hands, and behaving 
like one gone mad. 

" Vines and grapes ! vines and grapes ! " cried he in 



10 STORIES or MASSACHUSETTS. 

his own lano:uaoe of the Germans. " O such loads of vines 
and grapes ! " 

That night they slept — so runs the story. " In the 
morning I bade my sailors load the vessels with a cargo of 
the rich purple grapes, cut the vines, and fell some trees 
that we might prepare to return to our country. By-and- 
by the cold came and the snow and ice. Then came the 
warm sun again, and we sailed away from Vinland to 
Greenland, a fair w4nd to carry us all the way." 

A year or more after, the brother of Lief the Lucky 
came to Vinland. This party of Northmen the Indians 
attacked. " We did set up our battle-shields," so the tradi- 
tion tells us, "and guard ourselves against them. And 
we did fight with these Skraelings, and did sometimes drive 
them away. But their arrows killed our Thorwald, and 
we returned to Greenland." 

Just where this Vinland may have been no one knows. 
It may have been in Rhode Island ; it may have been in 
Massachusetts ; it may have been in Nova Scotia. In 
the city of Waltham, on the Charles River, there has been 
erected a very beautiful tower, the " Norumbega " — said to 
mark the site of the landing of these Northmen. But it is 
all very uncertain. Still, since Boston, our capital, has 
honored these Northmen with a statue of their leader Lief, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



11 



we want to know, at least, who they were, and also that 
certain relics have been found in our state which some anti- 
quarians still believe are proofs that the Northmen were 
once here. 

It makes very little real difference to you and me, 
except as a matter of historical curiosity, whether they 
came into our state or not. For they did not come to 
settle — they were not the sort of people to settle — 1)ut 
came merely to visit, to discover, to admire, and then to go 
awav. 



r 




'^^^^i^'MMiii 



NORTHMEN 
ON A VOYAGE. 



12 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




QUEKN KLIZABKTH. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 13 



THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

It was not till five centuries after the coming of the 
Norse Vikings that Massachusetts was settled by Euro- 
peans. 

At that time, there was in Old England a great 
religious excitement. People had not then learned that a 
man's idea of what God might be, and his idea of how he 
should worship, Avere matters that should not be interfered 
with. 

Many people, persecuted first for believing one way, 
then persecuted for believing another, fled at last to 
Holland, where they hoped to live in peace, free to believe 
what seemed to them right, regardless of any established 
form of church worship. 

Here in Holland they learned, what they once would 
would hardly have thought possible ; that God was just as 
near to them, just as ready to hear them and to protect 
them in a little, simple, out-door service as in the beautiful, 
dimly lighted English churches with their grand architec- 
ture, their rich stained-glass windows and their costly 
shrines and altars. 



14 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

As these people came back from time to time to Eng- 
land, their influence began to be felt throughout the coun- 
try. Everywhere the simple church services began to spring 
up. 

"The miserable, puritanical hypocrites" said Eliza- 
beth, who was then Queen of England ; " they shall conform 
to the English Church." 

Now when Elizabeth said a thing, she meant it ; and 
woe unto a people who dared defy her. 

Troops were stationed in every hamlet suspected of 
harboring one of these Puritan families ; the leaders were 
tortured and hanged ; their houses burned ; and their 
families thrown into prison. 

Year after year this went on ; the Puritans grew 
bolder and bolder ; Elizabeth grew angrier and angrier ; 
to meet one on the roadside, it is said, as she drove along 
in her grand royal carriage, would throw he'r into a perfect 
paroxysm of anger. 

And, indeed, it grew very easy to distinguish one of 
these people from any other people in the country ; for 
earnest, sincere, and over-zealous as they were, they had 
grown to be a little fanatical. They had even come to 
openly rebuke the elegance of the court and the church, and 
even avow their deep conviction that anything but the 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 15 

simplest clothing, the barest churches, the strictest sobriety 
in language and conduct was actually sinful and displeasing 
in the extreme to the Almighty. 

They themselves wore the plainest, most sober-colored 
clothing. The men wore their hair closely cropped and 
their faces smoothly shaven. They spoke little ; seldom 
laughed ; and discouraged all fun, even for their children, as 
something foolish and unnecessary, if not out-and-out 
sinful . 

But to make a long story short, let me tell you at 
once that these Puritans were the people who, to escape 
persecution and to enjoy the privilege of being religious in 
their own way , fled for protection to the uninhabited coun- 
try of America. 

These were the people who, in a single vessel, the 
Mayflower, crossed the stormy ocean, and, on the 
twenty-second of December, 1620, sailed into the little 
harbor of Plymouth, and there began the settlement of 
Massachusetts. 

This colony, settled by thes.e early pilgrims to 
America, was, I want you to distinctly remember, the 
Plymouth Colony. In a following chapter we shall read 
of another colony, a little later in its settlement, which 
was known by an entirely diflerent name. 




A VISIT FROM THE INDIANS 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



17 




THE SETTLERS AT PLYMOUTH. 

It was a cold, stormy day in December, 1620, that the 
Pilgrims landed at Plymouth. Their one small vessel, the 
Mayflower, was an odd looking little craft, and as it 
rocked and rolled, upon the rough waters in the bay, it 
seemed a wonder that so frail a vessel should ever have suc- 
ceeded in safely crossing the great ocean. But there it 
was, and there were the hundred brave men and women who 
had come in it to these barren shores of Massachusetts — 
come to escape the persecution in England of Avhich you 
have just read. 



18 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

They were strange people for their times. They 
dressed strangely and acted rather strangely, too, so the 
English thought. Now it was the fashion in those days for 
gentlemen to wear their hair very long, and to dress in very 
rich and elegant clothes ; but these people l^elieved in the 
greatest possil)le simplicity in dress, in customs, in every- 
thing, in short. 

They wore the very plainest and cheapest of clothes, 
shaved their heads (so that they were often nicknamed 
Roundheads !) would not have any music in their churches, 
and hardly allowed themselves or their children to laugh 
and play. 

As we have said, this little band of Pilgrims, as they 
liked to call themselves, sailed into t}ie rough, cold, unin- 
viting harbor on one of those chilly, disagreeable days so 
familiar to those of us who live here upon. the Atlantic coast. 
They had intended to make their home much farther south 
— towards Virginia, where the earlier colonies had been 
settled, and where the climate is so warm and delightful 
but it had been a stormy month, and the little "Mayflower'' 
had ])een driven here and there upon the water, until at last 
the little band of Pilgrims w^ere glad enough to land at any 
place . 

'^ We would have been glad to have landed in a warmer 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



19 




PLYMOUTH ROCK. 



climate," said one of the men, as they looked about over the 
snowy hills and out upon the icy bay ; " but Providence has 
directed us hither, and it is for some good purpose." 

Have you ever visited the quaint little town of 



20 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 21 

Plymouth? If you have, I suppose you have seen the very 
rock — Plymouth Rock — on which it is said the Pilgrims 
landed. It isn't a very large rock, is it? They must have 
leaped out one by one upon it, I am sure. Certainly no 
hundred people ever stood together upon it — as some his- 
torians have said — and sent up their songs and prayers 
of thanksgiving. But very likely they gathered and knelt 
close around it, and their good pastor stood upon it and 
offered up his prayer. 

It was cold — ])itterly cold, but the Pilgrims were not 
the sort of people to whine over their misfortunes or to 
spend time in vain repinings. At once they went to work, 
felled the trees, cleared the ground, and made for them- 
selves snug little houses,. into which you may be sure they 
were glad enough to move their scanty possessions which 
they had brought over with them in the Mayflower. 

Can you not hear their axes ringing through the great 
forests ? Can you not see the great fires that were built at 
night to keep a^\'ay the wolves, whose bowlings were to be 
heard on every side as the dark night came on ? 

Brave, brave people Avere these fore-fathers and fore- 
mothers of ours ! How they worked and helped and 
cheered each other on in these first hard days of colonial 
life ! The men felled the trees and built the rough little 



22 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




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STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 23 

huts ; and the women washed and ironed, baked and brewed, 
pounded their own corn for meal and spun their own cloth 
for clothes, making their rude homes happy and cheerful in 
the thousand little ways that wives and mothers under- 
stand. 

There were not in these first days very many children 
in the colony, but such as they were, they were brave little 
boys and girls — as brave in their way as were their fathers 
and mothers. 

And there were two little baby boys — born during 
the voyage across the ocean. 

Such wee, Avee babies as they were ! And the pets of 
the whole colony. The name of one was Peregrine White 
— Peregrine, which means wandering, because he was born 
while the Pilorims were wanderinoj about seeking for a 

CD O O 

home. 

In Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth, you will find even now the 
very cradle in which little Peregrine used to lie and kick 
and laugh — and very likely scream and cry, as all babies 
in all times ever have done, and, no doubt, ever will. The 
other little baby was named Oceanic Hopkins, from the 
ocean on which he was born . 

These colonists, as you have been told before, were 
very rigid, simple people. 



24 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 25 



SOME LEADING MEN OF PLYMOUTH COLONY. 

The first governor of the Plymouth Colony was John 
Carver. He was a good, brave, peace-loving man. He 
lived only a few months after the settlement of the colony, 
but during that time he proved how wise he was and how 
true in his dealings with the Indians. 

One day an Indian came to him and told him that 
Massasoit, chief of one of the tribes, was preparing war 
against the white settlement. 

"We must settle this," said he, mildly, yet firmly, 
"as with brother and brother." 

Accordingly he sent for Massasoit, told him as well as 
he could by means of signs and pictures and the little 
language that had been learned of each other, why the 
white men had come, and what they wished to build up for 
themselves ; he also told them that they would be glad if 
the Indians would trust them, live side by side with them, 
and be friends. 

Massasoit was honorable in his savage way, and felt the 
kindness and love in the white governor's words and manner. 
The " pipe of peace" was smoked, and a treaty made between 
the two chiefs which Massasoit honestly kept his life long. 



26 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

After the death of John Carver, William Bradford 
was made governor. He was brave and daring. When, 
not long after Carver's death, trouble seemed possible with 
a tribe of Indians called the Narragansetts, Bradford 
proved his daring in a way which was long remembered 
and admired by the colonists. 

One of the Narragansett chiefs sent to Bradford a 
snake-skin stuffed full of arrows. This was the Narragan- 
sett way of saying, "I am your enemy. Beware! for I 
and my warriors are ready to attack your settlement. 
Our arrows are prepared for you." 

But Governor Bradford, not one atom disturbed or 
frightened, quietly emptied the snake-skin upon the 
ground, filled it full to the brim with powder and shot, and 
sent it as his reply to the Narragansett chief. 

Whether the Narragansett chief thought it wise to 
keep away from so plucky a governor, we do not know; 
but one thing is sure, that he gave the colony no 
further trouble. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



27 




JfUAi ^'f'mdaR^ 



MILES STANDISH'S AUTOGRAPH, SWORD AND DISH. 



MILES STANDISH. 

Miles Standish was the soldier of the colony. He had 
been in many wars in Europe, and now, here in the 
colony, he was foremost in any trouble. He had brought 
to America with him a beautiful little wife named Rose. 
She was a delicate little flower, not at all suited to the 
rough, bleak climate, and soon faded away and died. 

I suppose I ought to tell you of some of the marvelous 
exploits of Miles Standish against the Indians in these 
earl}^ times. He was a brave, daring man, and you may 
be sure his name came to be a terror to the Indians round- 



28 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

about. No man was more respected throughout the colony 
than was this daring soldier ; to no man did the colonists 
owe more for help and protection. 

But for all this, I believe the story of him that will pass 
down in the years to come, is the story of his courtship, 
which Longfellow has put into such beautiful form. 

One day John Alden, Miles Standish's nearest friend, 
sat writing letters for the good captain. The captain, 
pacing up and down the room, turned suddenly and said : 
"Friend, when you have finished your work, I have some- 
thing important to tell you." And then as if half ashamed 
of himself for breaking in in this unbusiness-like way, he 
added : " Be not, however, in haste ; I can wait. I shall 
not be impatient." 

" Speak," replied Alden, with that respectful tone in 
which in those days it was more the fashion than now for 
men to address each other. " Whenever you speak I am 
ready to listen, — always ready to hear whatever pertains to 
Miles Standish." 

C Then the great strong man, the famous captain, the bold, 
daring, fearless captain, began, like a very school-boy, to 
stutter and stammer out his message.^ "It is not good for 
man to be alone ; the Bible says so." And then he walked 
back and forth. Alden waited, perplexed, possibly amused. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 29 

" This I have said before, and I again repeat it : It is not 
good for man to be alone." 

John Alden smiled. The great captain was embarrassed, 
but at last the story was out. There Avas in the little town 
a beautiful maiden, Priscilla. She was alone in the world. 
In the long, hard winter her father, her mother and her 
brother, all had died ; and now with that sad, lonely, weary, 
pleading face, so gentle, so sorrowful, she passed up and 
down the streets from the house to the little burial ground ; 
from the burial ground to her home again. 

Not a man or woman in the town but pitied her, and 
the great, strong captain's heart was touched. "Patient, 
courageous, strong," said he, thinking of the sweet Rose 
Standish now lying in her grave in that sunny spot so 
dear to him. "If ever there were angels on earth, as there 
are angels in heaven, two have I seen and known ; and 
the angel whose name is Priscilla holds in my desolate 
heart the place Avhich the other abandoned." 

"And now," continued the captain, "I am a coward in 
this, though valiant enough in most things ; wilt thou, John 
Alden, my friend, go to the maiden Priscilla and say to her 
that a blunt old captain, one not of words but of deeds, 
offers his hand and his heart. But I am a maker of war, 
not of words ; you who were bred a scholar can say it in 



30 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

elegant language, such as one reads in books, and which is 
quick to win the heart of a maiden." 

This was a stransfe thins^ to ask one's friend to do for 
him, was it not? But to John Alden it was more than 
strange. And for this reason : he loved the maiden him- 
self, and only a moment before, in the very letter he had 
just been writing home to old England, he had written 
page on page of this l^eautiful maiden Priscilla, of whom 
his heart was so full. And here stood his friend, his strong 
friend whom he loved so, and to Avhoni he owed so much 
of friendship and loyalty, asking him to go to this Priscilla 
and plead with her to make his — Miles Standish's — home 
cheerful and beautiful, when with all his heart he longed to 
have her in his own. 

But Standish was his friend, and Alden was honorable. 
"I will go," answered he, in a husky, heavy voice; but 
Standish heard not the tone — only the words which he 
wished to hear reached him. 

And so John Alden went forth on his bitter errand. 
He found the maiden in her home, busy at the spinning- 
wheel. She greeted him with a happy smile, "I knew it 
was you when I heard your step in the passage," said she, 
simply, "for I was thinking of you as I sat here singing 
and spinning." 



STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 31 

Poor John Alden ! I am afraid this gentle greeting 
made his errand none the less easy. 

Then they sat and talked of the beautiful springtime, 
talked of their friends at home, and of the May-Flower 
that sailed on the morrow. "I have been thinking all 
day," said Priscilla, the tears coming into her great brown 
eyes, "of the hedges and the fields in England. They are 
ail in blossom now and the country is like a great garden. 
Kind are the people here whom I live with. I love them, 
but sometimes — I cannot help it, — I am so lonely and 
wretched, I almost wish myself back in Old England." 

"Indeed, I do not condemn you," answered Alden, 
sadly ; and then with a struggle , he burst out — the 
Captain himself could not have been more blunt — 
" Stouter hearts than yours have quailed in this terrible 
winter. So I have come to you now with an off'er of 
marriage from a good, true man, Miles Standish, our Cap- 
tain of Plymouth." 

Priscilla sat mute with amazement and sorrow. This 
from John Alden, whom she loved and who, she had 
believed, loved her. 

Then she said, "If this brave captain is so eager to 
wed me, why does he not come himself Avith his offer?" 

John Alden, gathering up his scattered thoughts, or 



82 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS 

_^__ :: - 



^^^" 




/ 



t'}*^. 







-l^^'i^Sis^r-^^ 



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STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 33 

at least, trying to, began to answer. " The Captain was too 
busy — he had no time — he " — but the more he said, since 
his heart was not in it, the more entangled he became. 

At first Priscilla was angry, indignant. Alden only 
plead the more strongly for his friend ; but the stronger 
his pleadings, the more his own love shone out in his eyes. 
Till at last, seeing how matters stood, Priscilla, with a 
smile, her eyes over-running with laughter, said, "John, 
why don't you speak for yourself ? " 

And John did speak for himself, it is supposed, though 
nobody was there to hear him ; for when the spring opened 
there was a pretty little wedding in the village church ; and 
it was John and Priscilla who walked down the aisle 
together and by-and-by came out together and went away 
to a home all their very own. 

Miles Standish, it is said, was angry, and stormed and 
raved, and made threats with his sword when Alden 
returned to him and told him of his failure and his success. 
"John Alden, you have betrayed me! Me! Miles 
Standish, your friend, you have supplanted, defrauded, 
betrayed me ! Henceforward let there be nothing between 
us save war and implacable hatred ! " 

But Standish was a noble-hearted man and a just 
man. And when he saw how happy John and Priscilla 



34 STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

were, and how brave and handsome they looked as they 
stood beside each other, he remembered the dear Rose 
Standish now dead. His kind heart relented, he forgave 
them, and at the wedding, no greeting was warmer or kinder 
than that of Miles Standish. 

'* Grasping the bridegroom's hand he said with emotion, 
' Forgive me ! 

I have been angry and hui't, — too long have I cherished the 
feeling ; 

I have been cruel and hard, but now, thank God ! it is ended. 

Mine is the same hot blood that leaped in the veins of Hugh 
Standish, 

Sensitive, swift to resent, bat as swift in atoning for error. 

Never so much as now was Miles Standish a friend of John 
Alden.' 

Thereupon answered the bridegroom : ' Let all be forgotten 
between us, — 

All save the dear old friendship, and that shall grow older and 
dearer ! ' 

Then the captain advanced, and^ bowing, saluted Priscilla, 

Gravely, and after the manner of old-fashioned gentry in 
England, 

Something of camp and court, of town and of country, com- 
mingled. 

Wishing her joy of her wedding, and loudly lauding her husband. 

Then he said with a smile : ' I should have remembered the 
adage, — 

If you would be well- served, you must serve yourself ; and more- 
over. 

No man can srather cherries in Kent at the season of Christmas ! ' 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 35 





^ ^hzr^^ 



THE FIRST PROCLAMATION OF MILES STANDISH, 

NOVEMBER A. D., 1620. 

" Ho, Rose ! " quoth the stout Miles Standish, 
As he stood on the Mayflower's deck, 
And gazed on the sandy coast line 
That loomed as a misty speck 

On the edge of the distant offlng, — 

' ' See ! yonder we have in view 
Bartholomew Gosnold's ' headlands.' 

'Twas in sixteen hundred and two 

'» That the Concord of Dartmouth anchored 
Just where the beach is broad, 
And the merry old captain named it 

(Half swamped by the fish) — Cape Cod. 



36 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

'' And so as his mighty ' headlands ' 
Are scarcely a league away, 
What say you to landing, sweetheart, 
And having a washing-day? 

" For did not the mighty Leader 
Who guided the chosen band 
Pause under the peaks of Sinai, 
And issue his strict command — 

" (For even the least assoilment 
Of Egypt the spirit loathes) — 
Or ever they entered Canaan, 

The people should wash their clothes? 

" The land we have left is noisome, 
And rank with the smirch of sin ; 
The land that we seek should find us 
Clean-vestured without and within." 



" Dear heart " — and the sweet Rose Standish 
Looked up with a tear in her eye ; 
She was back in the flag-stoned kitchen 
Where she watched, in the days gone by, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 37 

Her mother among her maidens, 

(She should watch them no more, alas! 
And saw as they stretched the linen 

To bleach on the Suffolk grass. 

In a moment her brow was cloudless, 

As she leaned on the vessel's rail, 
And thought of the sea-stained garments, 

Of coif and of farthingale ; 

And the doublets of fine Welsh flannel. 

The tuckers and homespun gowns. 
And the piles of hosen knitted 

From tlie wool of the Devon downs. 

So the matrons aboard the Mayflower 

Made ready with eager hand 
To drop from the deck their baskets 

As soon as the prow touched land. 

And there did the Pilgrim Mothers, 

"On a Monday," the record says, 
Ordain for their new-found England 

The first of her washing-days. 

And there did the Pilgrim Fathers, 

With matchlock and axe well slung, 
Keep guard o'er the smoking kettles 

That propt on the crotches hung. 



38 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

For the trail of the startled savage 

Was over the marshy grass, 
And the glint of his eyes kept peering 

Through cedar and sassafras. 

And the children were mad with pleasure. 

As they gathered the twigs in sheaves, 
And piled on the fire the fagots, 

And heaped up the autumn leaves. 

'' Do the thing that is next," saith the proverb, 
And a nobler shall yet succeed ; — 
'Tis the motive exalts the action ; 
'Tis the doing and not the deed ; 

For the earliest act of the heroes 

Whose fame has a world-wide sway 
Was — to fashion a crane for a kettle. 
And order a washing-day ! 

— Margaret J. Preston. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 39 



INDIAN TROUBLES IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF 
MASSACHUSETTS, 

For a long time after the first landing of the Pilgrims, 
they were unmolested by the red men. But one morning 
in March, down came an Indian into their little town. 
The Pilgrims were not overjoyed to see this Indian; 
but they welcomed him politely and waited for him to 
speak. 

"Welcome, welcome," said the Indian. 

Samoset, for that was the name of the Indian visitor, 
was arrayed strangely enough in feathers and fur and col- 
ored with bright paints. This was the red man's idea of a 
visiting costume. 

He was pleased with the welcome he received from 
the white men — so much pleased, that on the next day he 
came again, not waiting for the Pilgrims to return his 
call, and this time he brought with him five other Indians. 

Such a pleasant day as their six visitors seemed to have ! 
They drank and ate everything they saw, seeming to think 
it perfectly right and proper to take whatever they liked. 

At sunset the five Indians went away ; but Samoset 
staid on and on, until, in despair, the white men asked him 



40 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 41 

if he would go and find Massasoit, the Indian chief, and ask 
him to come to the colony. 

Massasoit came. He sat down peaceably in the little 
hut of John Carver, and together they smoked the pipe of 
peace, and agreed never to interfere with each other. This 
treaty was always honestly and faithfully kept as long as 
Massasoit lived. 

But late in the history of the colony, and in the early 
history of Massachusetts, there was more or less trouble 
with the Indians always at hand. 

Innocent and trustful as they had been when the first 
white men came to America, they had long since learned to 
hate and to fear the white men. They had learned that the 
white men could not always be trusted ; they had learned 
they would lie to them, cheat them and destroy their 
homes, and they had, accordingly, arrived at the conclu- 
sion that if they would keep their homes and their lands 
free, they must fight for them. And fight they did in 
their own terrible way, with arrows and tomahawks, and 
from behind trees and rocks. 

Nothing did they enjoy more than to swoop down 
upon some innocent, unsuspecting fimiily at night and mur- 
der them all, burn their house and yell and dance and sing 
as they flourished their bloody tomahawks above the flames. 



42 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




O o 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 43 




KING PHILIP'S WAR. 

After the death of Massasoit, the Massachusetts colon- 
ists did not fare so well with their Indian neighbors. 

In 1675 King Philip, the Indian chief, made war 
upon them. "We shall have no lands left to us," said 
Philip. "Every year more and more of these white men 
come and build homes in our land, every year we are 
pushed farther and farther back. Therefore let us join 
our forces and destroy these settlements one and all." 

The first attack was made upon the little village of 
Swansey. As was the custom of these simple villagers, all 
were assembled at their little church to listen to the long, 
long sermon which every Sunday it was their preacher's 
delio^ht to read to them and their delight to listen to. 



44 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

As they came slowly out from the little building, into 
the bright, warm sunlight, thinking, no doubt, how beauti- 
tiful and quiet it all was, suddenly there rose upon the still 
air, the much dreaded, much feared Indian war-whoop. 

They stood still and listened ! Their cheeks paled ; 
the men grasped their muskets ! The mothers drew the 
children close about them ! 

Suddenly out from the trees and rocks rushed the 
angry red men, brandishing their tomahawks, and yelling 
with rage and excitement. 

An awful massacre followed — a sickening, terrible 
scene ! 

After this, hardly a day or night but some innocent 
village, some unprotected household was visited by the 
wrath of the Indians. 

For a long time the war raged. It seemed sometimes 
as if the Indians would indeed succeed in their horrible pur- 
pose of slaying every man, woman and child in the colony. 

But at last Philip himself was slain in battle, and thus 
a deathblow was struck to the horrible war. 

"Now," said the colonists, " if we can but find Anna- 
won, King Philip's right hand man, and capture him, we 
shall be safe again. With their leaders slain these 
Indians would have no courage to carry on the war." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 45 

Annawon, it was found, had made his camp in a 
swamp, where as he supposed, he was well concealed and 
safe from attack. 

Captain Church, a brave Puritan soldier, was wise 
enough to find it and came upon Annawon asleep before 
his tent. 

Down upon him rushed the white men, and before 
Annawon even knew the white men had come, he was 
their prisoner. ■ 

"Now," said Captain Church, turning to the Indians, 
"there are hundreds of white men outside the camp who 
at a signal from me will rush in to destroy you. If, how- 
ever, you surrender and promise peace for the future, your 
lives shall be spared." 

"We surrender," said the Indians. Thus ended King 
Philip's War, one of the lonoest and most awful of all the 
Indian wars during the colonial period in any part of the 
country. It was one fearful succession of massacres upon 
massacres until there seemed little hope for the colonies. 
When at last King Philip and Annawon were conquered, 
you may l)e sure it was a happy day, a day of rejoicing and 
thanksgiving throughout the Massachusetts homes and in 
the hearts of the few surviving colonists. 



46 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY COLONY. 

It was on the twenty-ninth of June, nine years after 
the settlement of the Plymouth Colony, that there came 
sailing into Massachusetts Bay thence into the harbor at 
Salem, a fleet of five vessels, one of them the self-same 
Mayflower that had brought the Pilgrims. 

For six long weeks these vessels had been crossing the 
Atlantic ; but it had been a comfortable, prosperous voyage, 
in warm summer weather, there had been plenty of food, 
no fear, no dread of possible poverty and suffering. For 
these people were all "well to do" people, some of them 
even of the " nobility : " they had not come driven from 
England by persecution, but rather simply to take up the 
grant of land given them by the king, with the hope of 
building for themselves a new city where they could enjoy 
perfect freedom for themselves, be free from the many 
restrictions in both church and state. They had cool, calcu- 
lating business plans also ; for in these nine years it had 
come to be well understood that there were certain possibili- 
ties for American trade well worthy the interest of business 
men. 

In the quaint language of the times, one of these emi- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 47 

grants wrote of the voyage, " Our passage was both pleas- 
urable and profitable ; for we received instruction and 
delight in beholding the wonders of the Lord in the deep 
waters, and sometimes seeing the sea round us appearing 
with a terrible countenance, and, as it were, full of high 
hills and deep valleys ; and sometimes it appeared as a 
most plain and even meadow." 

The landing, too, in this beautiful warm month of July 
was different indeed from that of the Pilgrims, who, midst 
winter snow and bitter cold, stepped out on an unknown 
shore, barren, snow-covered, inhospitable. 

When they came along the coast, the same writer says, 
"By noon we were within three leagues of Cape Ann ; and, 
as we sailed along the coast, we saw every hill and dale, 
and every island, full of gay woods and high trees. The 
nearer we came to the shore, the more flowers in abun- 
dance ; sometimes scattered abroad, sometimes joined in 
sheets nine or ten yards long, which we supposed to be 
brought from the low meadows by the tide. Now, what 
with pine woods and green trees by land, and these yellow 
flowers painting the sea, we were all desirous to see our 
new paradise of New England, whence we saw such fore- 
running signals of fertility afar off"." 

This colony was strong, even rich, compared with 



48 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



Plymouth Colony. They founded their colony at Salem, 
and gave it that name, from the Hebrew word meaning 
"Peace." 

Later, they .settled Boston and many of the surround- 
ins: towns. And now we have two flourishin<>- colonies — 
both made up of Puritans, both honest, industrious, God- 
fearing ; both of the Puritan religion, both desirous of free- 
dom and independence. 

For a long time these two colonies remained separate, 
not from any especial lack of friendly feeling, but simply 
because it had happened that they came under different 
circumstances. And by-and-l)y they were, as they grew 
older and stronger, united under the name of Massachusetts. 
The word, it is said, means Blue Hills, and was taken from 
the name of an Indian tribe then livino- near the colonists. 





MASSACHUSETTS CENT OF 1787. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



49 




JOHN WINTHROP. 



JOHN WINTHROP. 

John Winthrop, one of England's wealthy men, sold 
his vast acres and came to the little Massachusetts Bay 
Colony, that he might he free to carry out such religious 
views as he chose to hold. "I go" said he, "to plant a 
free church in the wilderness." 

He was a man of grave, but generous, kindly counten- 
ance, dignified, gentle in his manners, ready always 



50 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 51 

with a sympathetic word, and greatly loved by his 
people. 

Twelve times was he elected governor of the little 
colony, and three times deputy-general. He was the 
founder of Boston. His residence was on Washington 
street, and the ground now occupied by "The Old South" 
was then a part of his beautiful, shaded garden. 

During all these early days of the colony, John Win- 
throp kept a journal, which has since proved of untold 
value to Massachusetts history. 

Governor Winthrop's settlement in Boston grew very 
rapidly. Many able men from England came to it, so 
that from the very beginning there was a certain air of 
refinement and education that by-and-by led to the early 
foundino* of our s^ood old Harvard Colleofe. 

There was in the colony a Deputy-Governor Dudley, 
who, through some misunderstanding with Winthrop, held 
for a long time a rather active enmity towards him.. He 
wrote him hard, insulting letters, and did not hesitate to 
openly denounce him. Certainly, whatever may have been 
the cause and however just, the conduct of Dudley was 
hardly dignified or worthy of a man of his age and position. 

John Winthrop, in nothing more than in this, showed 
his noble character and true refinement. He would not 



52 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

quarrel, he would take no part in it. " I could resign my 
position as governor," he once said, "but my position as a 
gentleman I must never resign." 

At another time, when he had received an insulting 
letter from Dudley, he returned it, calmly saying to the mes- 
senger, " I cannot aftbrd to keep so unworthy a reminder 
of Massachusetts' Deputy-Governor." At another time he 
said sadly," I am sorry we are so like quarrelsome children." 

But there came a time when Dudley, ashamed of him- 
self, said most frankly to Winthrop, "Your overcoming 
yourself hath overcome me." 

The two men were friends again. In a written history 
of the times, there is this simple, sweet story of their 
" making up " as you children call it. 

The Governor and Deputy-Governor went down to 
Concord to view some lands for farms. 

They offered each other the first choice, l)ut because 
the Deputy's was first granted, and himself had store of 
land already, the Governor yielded him the choice. So at 
the place where the Deputy's land was to begin there were 
two great stones which they called Two Brothers. 

They did this in remembrance that they were brothers 
by their children's marriage and did so brotherly agree. A 
little creek near those stones was to part their lands," 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 63 



THE FIRST HOUSE IN BOSTON. 

If you have ever seen a picture, Boston children, of 
the first house which was built in your city in the year 
1623, on Avhat is now Beacon street, you were probably 
slow to imagine that this fine street, with its rows of 
beautiful residences, could ever have contained such an 
odd-lookinsf little house. 

Beacon Hill we consider a beautiful site now ; but it 
must have been even more lovely then, looking down upon 
the forests along the Charles, the pretty, sparkling 
harbor, and the pine-shadowed hills along the Mystic 
River. 

In that odd little house there lived one ''lone bachelor," 
William Blackstone. He was a natural hermit — that is, he 
loved the solitude of the forest rather than people. He was 
not over fond of the Puritans ; for he was a staunch up- 
holder of the EnHish Church and considered the Puritans 



54 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

a body of fanatics, who should have been whipped into 
obedience in the bei^inninof. 

He had been educated in one of the finest English col- 
leges, and had begun life as a clergyman ; but hearing so 
much of the grand old American forests, and for reasons of 
his own, unknown perhaps in history, he left his home and 
came here, and built for himself a new house on the sunny 
slope of Beacon Hill. 

For seven years he lived there, quite alone, with no 
one for neighbors but the Indians. At the end of that 
time, on account of a general illness that broke out in 
Salem, supposed to be due to impure water, William Black- 
stone invited the people of that settlement to come to Bos- 
ton, telling them how pure and clear were the springs of 
water about Beacon Hill. 

The invitation was gladly accepted, and settlers from 
Salem began to build around the three l)eautiful hills. For 
some reason, no sooner had the people come, than Black- 
stone left his own settlement and went deeper into the wil- 
derness. 

Boston Common was a part of Blackstone's farm, and the 
crooked Boston streets are said, by people who like to 
laugh at our pet city, to have been made by the wanderings 
of William Blackstone's cow. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 55 



KING'S CHAPEL BURYING-GROUND. 

No building in Boston would attract more the atten- 
tion of an intelligent visitor than the quaint little stone 
church on Tremont Street. And adjoining the church is 
the quiet little burial-ground with its odd-looking grave- 
stones, and its moss-covered tombs. 

When good Isaac Johnson came over with his beauti- 
ful wife, Lady Arbella, and bought this sunny, woody hill- 
side as a site for their new home, he little thought what the 
end would be. 

Isaac Johnson was a wealthy English gentleman, the 
owner of broad estates in England. The Lady Arbella 
was the beautiful, accomplished daughter of an English 
earl. But both had joined the great class of new church 
people and were, therefore, the subject of quite as much 
ridicule as any of the Puritans from less distinguished 
families. So, leaving their beautiful home, they came to 
the "wilderness," as the colony was called, that they might 
be free from the ridicule and insults that everywhere were 
their share; they sailed with John Winthrop's party, and 
came to Salem. 

Hearing of the beauty of the scenery of Boston, Isaac 



56 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 57 

Johnson traveled from Salem to find a place for his new 
home. Standing upon Beacon Hill, he looked down upon 
the rich forests sloping the shore, and upon the sparkling 
waters beyond. "This is like the view from Lady Arbella's 
Eno^lish home!" said he. " I will build our house where 
she can look out upon the water." 

Isaac Johnson was very proud of his beautiful wife and 
thought no place in all America was too good for the Lady 
Arbella, and began at once felling the trees and making a 
clearing for their new home. " Now," said he, as he looked 
with delight upon it, "I will go to Arbella and tell her that Ave 
are ready to build our home." 

One bright, beautiful morning he started off through 
the forest paths and across the fields to Salem. It was a 
long journey, l)ut he did not mind, for did not every step 
bring him nearer the dear Arbella who was waiting to hear 
of her new home ? 

But all these weeks. Lady Arbella had been very, very 
ill. Isaac Johnson did not know of it ; and when he 
reached Salem, only in time to see the dear wife die, his 
true, noble heai-t was broken. 

They buried her under the shadow of the oaks and 
pines, where not long ago the Salem people erected a pretty 
little stone church in honor of her. 



58 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



Her husl)and did not live very many weeks after her 
death. "Why should I live?" he would say, wearily. 
And when other colonists came to him wishing to buy the 
beautiful slope of land which he had l)een so proud to 
call his, he would say, "No, I could not bear to see another 
home than mine there. Wait, and when I die, bury me on 
the spot Avhich was to have been our home." 

And so it was that his was the first grave in the 
King's Chapel burial-ground — so it was that Boston's 
first burial ground should be there upon the slope which 
now is the very center of business Boston. 




BELICS BROUGHT OVER IN THE MAYFLOWER. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



59 




COTTON MATHER. 



A BOSTON WITCH STORY. 

Th« story of " Old Goody Glover," though perhaps no 
different from many another witch story, will show you how 
the " witchcraft " craze possessed the people. 

One day the children of John Goodwin were taken 
strangely ill. They twisted themseves into all sorts of 
shapes, they mewed like cats, they barked like dogs, they 
even — so the story goes — flew through the air like geese. 

Old Cotton Mather, one of the strangest, most ianati- 



60 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

cal men of these times, and one of the ministers of the 
colony, was called in. 

" Terrible ! terrible ! " cried the excitable old man. 
" They are possessed of the devil ! they are possessed of the 
devil ! " 

"See," continued he, showing them a little book which 
he himself had written, " see, they will not read my 'Food 
for Babes ! ' " 

But if you could see Cotton Mather's Food for Babes, 
I think you would not think it any especial proof of any- 
thina: but wisdom that the children would not read it. To 
him, however, it was the best of books. " Indeed," said the 
strange old man, " I need no further proof that my ])ook is 
approved of heaven, than that these bewitched children 
fear it and will not read it." 

So old Cotton Mather, with a deep groan for the mis- 
fortune that had fallen upon the family, went away to 
gather other ministers together to come and help him drive 
away the wicked spirits. 

"Who has bewitched these children ! who has bewitched 
these children?" asked the excited people. - 

Now there was in the town one poor old woman, Goody 
Glover. The woman was not of his religion, and that, 
accordinir to Cotton Mather's idea, was enough to make 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 61 

her worthy of any suspicion thiit an ignorant or malicious 
person might put upon her. 

" And she has used threatening hmguage to me ! " said 
Dame Goodwin. 

" It is she ! " exclaimed Mather. And so poor Goody 
Glover was arrested and thrown into jail. 

The poor old woman, frightened half out of her senses 
at the threats and the hard questioning of her i^tersecutors, 
fell upon her knees, confessed that she had indeed 1)ewitched 
the children, and l)egged for mercy. But little mercy had 
her persecutors upon her. "Is the evil one standing by 
you now?" asked one of her accusers. 

" No,'- said she, frightened into answering. "No, he 
is just gone." 

" Hear that ? " cried Cotton Mather. " Isn't that proof 
enough ? " 

And so poor old Goody Glover was condemned to be 
hanged as a witch. On Boston Common, under the spread- 
ing branches of the "Old Elm," Goody Glover was hanged. 

This story, which is but one of so many Boston witch 
stories, will show you that witchcraft was by no means con- 
fined to Salem ; but that it would 1)e much more true to 
speak of it as colonial witchcraft rather than Salem witch- 
craft. 



62 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 

There w;is in England besides the Puritans, another 
class of "dissenters" called Quakers. It is said that they 
were given the name of Quakers in this way. One of 
them was brought before the court in England for trial. 
The judge condemned him, and the Quaker arose to plead 
for himself. He Avas a nervous, excitable man ; and, as he 
rose, his teeth chattered, his head treml)led, indeed he 
began to quake and shake from head to foot. Thereat the 
whole court roared with laughter. "Quake, quake, thou 
Quaker ! " cried an idle loafer among the people. 
"Quaker, quaker ! " sounded from every side. And so 
excellent a joke did it seem to the persecutors of these 
people that ever after they were called " Quakers." 

But you would suppose that when these Quakers fled 
to Massachusetts for protection, the Puritans, when they 
too had suffered from the same persecution, w^ould have 
received them with a welcome born of sympathy. 

But not so these Puritans. Freedom was good and 
necessary for them ; but they were not yet broad enough 
to see the justice of the same for other people, and were as 
cruel and unreasonable to the Quakers as ever the English 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 63 

Church people had been to them. They whipped them, 
they stoned them, they cut off their ears, they burned 
them with hot irons. O, there was no punishment too 
cruel for a Quaker ! 

Now the Quakers were strange looking people ; but so 
were the Puritans, as to that matter. And they had a 
strange idea of a church service ; but so had the Puritans. 
Strange that the Puritans could not see this. But they 
could not or would not ; and the unfortunate Quakers led a 
hard life of it among the Massachusetts colonists. 

There was one Quaker, Mary Dyer, who was hanged 
upon Boston Common for preaching the Quaker doctrine. 

" A preaching woman ? " cried the Puritans. "And a 
preaching Quaker woman ! Who ever heard of such a 
thing ! Away with her ! " 

Unable to bear the persecution, this woman, a kind, 
gentle-souled woman, for all her worst enemies could say, 
went to Rhode Island, where already Roger Williams had 
founded his colony, which, as he had said, should forever 
be open to any and all religious sects. All were wel- 
come. 

But as tidings reached her from day to day of the 
increasing persecution of the Quakers in Boston she 
determined to go to their assistance. Twice she was 



G4 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

driven from the town and threatened with hanging. But 
her people needed her, and she was fearless. " My people 
are suffering, starving, dying in prisons. I must aid 
them. It is right for me to enter Boston," she said, 
and a third time she came. 

She was at once seized, brought before the judge and 
condemned to be hanged. 

It was the 29th of October, 1G59. The streets were 
crowded with people waiting to see the unhappy woman as 
she was led forth. By her side walked two youths, 
Quakers, who were to be hanged with her. 

One of these, ascending the ladder, turned and. said, 
"Behold, I die for my faith." "Hold your tongue!" 
shouted some one from the crowd. " Woulds't thou die with 
a lie in thy mouth? " 

And the other youth, as the rope was fastened about 
his neck, cried, "Know all ye, that we die, not for wrong 
doing, but for conscience' sake ! " 

So earnest and sincere in their belief were these 
people. And now, the youths hanging dead before 
her eyes, Mary Dyer mounted the scafibld. Already she 
was blindfolded, and the rope was fastened ; when "Hold ! 
hold ! " and a horseman came galloping across the common, 
waving above his head a great white paper — the 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 65 

Governor's reprieve. Shouts of joy rang forth from those 
who had longed to save the woman ; hisses of scorn from 
those who had k)nged to see her hanged. 

It was the son of Mary Dyer, who, with pleading and 
with tears, had Avon the reprieve from the Governor. 

And now, with her brave son, she returned to Rhode 
Island. "We are rid of her," said the stern old Puritans. 
But no, a few months only, and again she was seized with 
the idea that she must go to Boston to aid the suffering 
Quakers. Nothing could prevent her. Her friends plead 
with her, luit in vain ; even the son who had loved her so 
could not prevail upon her to yield her determination to 
stand among the persecuted people. 

She had luit entered the city when she was seized 
upon by the officers and again carried before the judge. 
"This is stu])bornness, foolhardiness," said the judge. 
"Once more you are given to choose between leaving the 
colony and hanging." 

"I will not leave the colony until my people are free," 
she answered, with that quiet strength that seems always 
to sustain pioneers in any cause — fanatics though they 
may ])e. 

Again the governor was begged to save her ; but this 
time he would not. "She has made her own fate," said 



6Q STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

he. And at the appointed time she was led forth from the 
prison to the common ; and there, amid the crowd of angry 
Puritans, she was hanged, crying with her latest breath, 
" Behold, I die for my religion's sake ! " 

There was another woman, not a Quaker, of whom I 
may speak just here. She was a friend of Mary Dyer's 
and, like her, suffered and was persecuted for her religion's 
sake. 

This woman. Mistress Anne Hutchinson, was the 
daughter of an English clergyman ; and from childhood 
had been accustomed to listen to the learned talks of her 
father and the clerical friends with whom it had always 
been his pleasure to fill his house. 

These talks Anne had always enjoyed and there had, 
therefore, grown up with her an interest in those questions 
of doctrine that then, as now, were of such attraction 
to ministers. 

It is little wonder then, that when Mistress Anne 
Hutchinson came to America, where all seemed so fine and 
liberal, that she, Avith all her knowledge, should like to 
gather around her the women of the town and talk with 
them . 

More and more popular those talks grew to be from 
month to month. People began flocking into Boston from 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 67 

the towns around. At last the ministers grew concerned, 
then alarmed, then angry. "This woman," said they, "is 
getting the people away from us ! " And very likely she 
was, if one may judge what the fresh, bright thoughts of 
this wide-awake woman must have been in comparison with 
the kind of sermons the ministers used to inflict upon their 
people in these Puritanical times. 

Mrs. Hutchinson was brought before the judge to be 
tried for heresy. The trial was of little account ; for it 
was settled before the trial began, that she should be con- 
demned whatever her plea. It was a cruel, unjust trial; 
and, in the end, Mrs. Hutchinson was banished from the 
State ; and all because she gathered from week to week her 
friends about her, and taught them the Word of God as 
seemed to her. 

Mrs. Hutchinson went to Rhode Island, many of her 
friends going wdth her. There they lived in peace and 
quiet until, some five years after, the brave woman was 
killed in one of those cruel Indian massacres which in 
those days were so common. 

It is said that Mrs. Hutchinson was a quiet, well-bred, 
earnest w^oman ; less aggressive, less fanatical than Mary 
Dyer ; gentle, kind, loved by all who knew her well. 

It seems strange to us, in these days of liberal thought, 



68 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



that such a woman could have been so persecuted by an 
intelligent people, as the Puritans claimed to be. But 
it was the fashion of the times, both in America and in 
Europe, to condemn everything that was new, and persecute 
everybody who advanced a new opinion. Perhaps it is the 
fashion to do the same to-day? What do you think? 




FANEDIL HALL. 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 69 



THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY. 

Boston has given tea-parties from the very beginning 
of its earliest history ; it gives tea-parties now, such dainty, 
fashionable, pretty little tea-parties. It gave tea-parties 
in those days of the Revolution — parties just as 
pretty and dainty, just as fine and fashionable as these of 
our day. But there was one tea-party, known now the 
world over as the Boston Tea-Party, that was like no other 
tea-party, I think, ever known in fashionable or unfashion- 
able society. 

Here is the way this party came about. The British, 
you little readers of American History already know, had 
put a heavy tax upon tea, and had tried to force the Ameri- 
can colonists to buy it and to pay the tax upon it. 

"We will not buy it," the colonists had said. "We 
will drink catnip and sage — anything, everything, rather 
than pay the tax you set upon your tea. We will 
not pay it — we will not buy the tea — it shall not 
even be landed upon our wharves ! " 

One evening, just at sunset, when the beautiful har- 
bor was smiling and blushing beneath the last warm, 
lingering rays of the bright sun, a vessel came slowly 



70 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

in, up through the channel, nearer and nearer the 
wharf. 

A swash, a boom, a rattling of great chains, and the 
vessel is fastened to the pier. British soldiers disembark, 
the American officers seem helpless before the new forces. 
The British officers and the sailors saunter up into the city 
to meet old friends and rest themselves in once more walk- 
ing upon firm ground, with room enough and to spare. 
And there was an insolent air about these sailors — at least, 
so the Boston people thought — an air that said, " Well, 
we came into your port for all your threats. What have 
you to say now ? " 

For several days nothing was done ; the Boston people 
were quiet. There lay the British vessel at the wharf, 
armed with British soldiers, the tea unloaded, but seem- 
ingly only awaiting the convenience of the captain. 

But one nio^ht there was a o^reat noise at the wharf. A 
sudden outburst 1 Hark ! the Indian war-whoop ! the Indian 
war-whoop ! What does it mean ? Is not Boston safe yet 
from Indian attack ? The cries draw nearer, nearer ! 
Indians ! Indians ! See them ! See them, yelling, rushing, 
brandishing their tomahawks ! 

They rush upon the vessel ; down into the hold they 
go, yelling and whooping at every step. The sailors, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 71 

terrified, supposing it to be an attack from the horrible 
American Indians of whom they had heard, stood back 
aghast. 

But up come the Indians from the vessel's hold — 
crowding, pushing, shouting — and see ! they are rolling 
out the great tea-chests. 

What can it mean ! See ! see ! Over the vessel's sides 
they go, splash, splash, splash, into the water below. 
How the Indians yell ! how they shout ! how the waves 
roll and sparkle and tumble and leap about the great boat's 
bow. But see, the Indians are suddenly very quiet ! How 
orderly they are ! How slowly and thoughtfully they come 
oflf from the vessel's sides ! 

Indeed, these are strange Indians ! Indians never 
grow quiet like that ! Indians never walk like that ! I 
believe — perhaps — true as you are alive, they are not 
Indians at all ! No ! they are Boston men — citizens — 
dressed like Indians. O, now it is plain enough ! This is 
what the Boston people meant when, with such wise shakes 
of their heads, they said, "We'll see if there will be any 
tea landed at our wharves ! we'll see if we can be made to 
buy the English tea and pay the English tax ! " 

" This will prove a dear sort of an Indian caper, my 
boys," said an English officer, as the young men, disguised 



72 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

as Indians, went up the street from the wharf. "We are 
not afraid," replied the young men, and passed on. 

"These Americans have a will of their own," muttered 
the officer to himself; " they are England's own sons, and I 
fear it will be no easy matter to subdue them." 

Wise had it been for England, happy had it been for the 
colonists, had England recognized in this Boston Tea-Party 
the spirit of the people, had heeded the warning, and had made 
then and there just terms with the colonists who rebelled at 
nothing that was fair and right from the mother country. 
But England was stubborn and blind ; the colonists were ex- 
cited and defiant, and so the trouble grew bigger and bigger 
until, as you all know, the War of the Revolution began. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 73 



THE BOSTON MASSACRE. 

Foremost in the Revolution was our oood old state of 
Massachusetts. Into Boston poured the British troops, 
and round about Boston were the first battles fought. 

There were the Boston Massacre, the battle of Bunker 
Hill, the battle of Lexington, the Boston Tea Party and so 
many other events of the Revolution, — all within our own 
state, led by our own brave Massachusetts colonists. 

When the British troops sailed up Boston Harbor, 
and pitched their tents on Boston Common, and took 
possession of the Old South for a store house, you may be 
sure the dark days were close upon our Massachusetts 
colonists. 

It was a beautiful Sabbath morning when these British 
soldiers came marching into the little town of Boston. 
With banners flying, drums beating, up to the State House 
they marched, took possession of that, and then spreading 
themselves over the great, broad, beautiful common, they 
pitched their tents, showing the heavy-hearted Boston 
people that the enemy was indeed in their very midst. 

"Boston," said Gage, the British general, "shall be 
headquarters for British troops." 



74 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS, 

"We shall see," answered the enraged citizens. 

As would be natural, frequent quarrels took place 
between these British soldiers and the citizens of Boston ; 
but one night, when the soldiers had been unusually over- 
bearing and the hot-headed youths of the city had borne, as 
they thought, all that our American colonists could be 
expected to bear, an " out-and-out " quarrel blazed forth. 
The bells were rung, the alarm sounded, and out from 
their houses rushed the Boston people. 

"Fire, you lobster-backs!" cried the angry young 
colonists. "You dare not fire, you cowards !" 

This was more than soldier nature could endure. 
They did fire. The flash of the muskets lighted the dark 
streets ; the report rolled across the quiet little town. 
A great cloud of smoke overspread the scene. Slowly, 
heavily it lifted, as if dreading to reveal the horrible sight 
beneath it. There, upon the white snow, lay, dead or 
wounded, eleven of Boston's bravest lads. Blood was 
streaming, groans filled the air; the terror-stricken people, 
knowing now that war had indeed begun, lifted their 
dying lads sadly enough, knowing that those deep, purple 
blood stains upon the snow would never be forgotten, 
never be forgiven. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 75 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

On Milk Street, Boston, nearly opposite the Old 
South Church, was once the house in which Benjamin 
Franklin was born. And in the Old Granary Burial- 
Ground on Tremont street may be seen quite plainly the 
tomb bearing his name. 

Benjamin Franklin was then a Massachusetts boy, and 
although he spent so much of his life in Philadelphia, 
Massachusetts is by no means willing to give up her claim 
to this noble son of hers. 

James Franklin, Benjamin's brother, was a printer; 
and to him Benjamin was, at an early age, apprenticed. 
James was jealous of this younger brother who gave so 
much promise of future greatness, and did little to encourage 
him — rather everything to discourage him. 

At quite an early age Benjamin contributed to his 
brother's paper, but, you may be sure, it was quite without 
the knowledge of that brother. The way he managed to 
get his articles was this. At all sorts of odd times, before 
work in the morning, after work at night, when all the 
household were deep in sleep, he would do his writing ; 
then, when early in the morning he went to sweep out his 



76 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




BIRTHPLACE OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 



STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 77 

brother's office, he wouki put his articles on the editor's desk 
among other contributions, with no name signed, or, if any, 
with some " made up " name. 

One day, while reading one of these articles through, 
James said, "I'd like to find the writer of these. They are 
excellent — excellent — real talent there — thought — lan- 
guage ! " 

I fancy the little office lad was glad to get behind his 
brother, out of" the door, anywhere, to conceal the pleasure 
he felt in so generous a criticism of his work, as well as to 
conceal his amusement at the good word of praise which his 
brother would not for worlds have given him had he 
known it. 

No, indeed, all the king's oxen and all the king's 
iiien could never have drawn out a kind word of encour- 
agement from this jealous older lirother. 

"It was a hard life he led me," Benjamin used to say 
when he had become a man. "But it did me o'ood. It 
taught me to depend upon myself. Yes, yes, he taught 
me that a good kick out of doors is worth all the rich 
uncles in the world." 

When Benjamin became old enough, he ran away to 
Philadelphia. Then in time he became a well-known 
printer, writer, philosopher. 



78 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

He was sent by the government to England and to 
France to make arrangements between the nations. And 
it is said that by his education, his refinement, his gentle, 
courtly manners, he did more to prove to the European 
nations that the colonists were persons of worth than any 
one else could at that time have done. It was he who dis- 
covered a way, by means of a silk kite which he sent up 
during a thunder shower, of bringing down a charge of 
electricity from the clouds, and to his experiments the 
world still owes much. What do you suppose he would 
say if he could see to-day what wonderful uses of elec- 
tricity have resulted from these early experiments ? 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 79 



EDUCATION IN EARLY BOSTON. 

The Puritans of both colonies were, from the very 
beginning, wide awake to the importance of education ; 
and as soon as possible schools were located in the different 
settlements . 

Harvard College itself was founded only six years 
after the founding of Boston. The college building was 
only one little square, red brick building with low ceilings 
and small windows ; but at the time, it was considered a 
very elegant structure. It stands still upon the college 
grounds, surrounded now by many beautiful brick and 
stone buildings, which have been added to the college 
since these early days. 

But for the history of this little old building, the new, 
modern-built structures, with their beautiful carvings, their 
broad stair-cases and great halls and doorways, would seem 
much more attractive ; but when we remember that this 
little red building was the first college in America, that it 
has stood for over two hundred years and has sent into the 
world so many of our greatest and best men, you will under- 
stand that, after all, the little red brick building is prized 
more highly to-day than the far more ccjstly ones around it. 



80 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The founding of this college came about in this wise. 
Governor Winthrop, of whom you have already read, had, 
living in England, a very noble, intellectual sister, of whom 
he was very fond. "If only you were here, my sister 
Lucy," he would write, "then should I be content, indeed." 

The sister would have come gladly ; she longed to be 
with her great, good brother ; but there were no colleges 
in the new country, and she had a son growing up^ 
to whom, by and by, she wished to give a college 
education. 

"If only there was some place of learning for youths," 
she wrote, "It would make me go far nimbler to New 
England, if God should call me to it, than I otherwise 
should ; and I believe a college would put no small life 
into the plantation." 

This appeal from his sister set Governor Winthrop 
thinking. 

"My sister Lucy is right," said he, and accord- 
ingly, in a few months, work on a college-building was 
commenced. In due time Luc}^ Downing and her sons 
came to Boston to live with Governor Winthrop, and 
George, the son, for whose education his mother had been 
so careful, was one of the earliest graduates from Harvard 
College. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 81 

The Boston Latin School, however, is older even than 
Harvard Colleoe. 

"The exact position of the first schoolhouse is not 
known ; but it is matter of record that just ten years after 
the first employment of Mr. Pormort the town purchased 
of Mr. Thomas Scottow his dwelling-house and yard, 
which at this time (the 31st of March, A. D., 1645) was 
situated on the very lot upon a part of which the City Hall 
now stands ; and that in the October following the con- 
stables of the town were ordered to set off six shillino^s of 
the rate of Mr. Henry Messenger, the northerly abutter, 
^for mending the schoolm' his p^ of the partition fence 
between their gardens.' On this spot stood the first school- 
house in Boston of which we have any positive knowledge ; 
edging westerly upon the burial-ground, and fronting 
southerly upon the street which obtained its designation, 
School Lane, from this fact. As time wore on, the old 
schoolhouse, which had served not only as a place for 
nurturing the youth of the town but also for the indwelling 
of the master and his family, fell into decay ; and in order 
to make room for an enlargement of the neiohborino^ 
chapel, it was taken down in 1748, and another building 
was erected on the opposite side of the street. ^Master 
Lovell ' opposed the removal ; but the town agreed to it in 



82 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

a tumultuous meeting (April 18, 1748), by two hundred 
and five yeas to one hundi'ed and ninety-seven nays. In 
the afternoon of the same day this epigram was sent to Mr. 
Lovell : — 

" ' A fig for your learning ! I tell you the Town, 

To make the Church larger, must pull the School down.' 
' Unluckily spoken,' replied Master Birch, — 
' Then Jearning I fear, stops the growth of the Church.' " 

"In course of time, also, this building yielded to the 
effects of age and inadequacy, and was renewed about the 
year 1812," — on the site of the Parker House. "Up to 
this time the l^uildinij: w^as desiofnated as the Centre 
Schoolhouse, after which time it was properly called the 
Latin Schoolhouse. This building gave place to the one 
on Bedford Street, erected in the years 1843-44." 

There were, besides these, many primary schools here 
and there to which little boys and girls could go. And 
strange stories of teachers and pupils in these schools are 
told. I wonder what a Boston boy or girl of to-day would 
think of these early schools. Beating the children was 
the common method for keeping them in order and for 
forcing them to study. One little boy, who afterwards 
became Gen. Oliver, says of one of his teachers ; 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 83 

" He gjive me a whipping, but soon after discovered 
that I was not guilty of the act for which I had been 
whipped. 'Never mind, Oliver,' he said, 'I will put this 
to your credit for the next misconduct and it will not be 
long before the account will stand all right.' " 

The schools in these early times were taught only by 
men. Now and then, in "haying time" when the men were 
busy, the children were passed over into the charge of 
women teachers, but that was all. 

And what do you think, little boys and girls ! in these 
early times, girls were not allowed to attend any school 
above the primary schools ! " Girls cannot learn," some 
said. " They do not need to learn ! " said others. "They 
haven't brains enough to learn ! " said others still. What 
do you suppose these Puritans would say if they could look 
into Boston now and see the boys and girls studying 
together side by side in the common schools, the high 
schools, the Latin schools,! am afraid they would say the 
world has turned topsy-turvy since their day. And so it 
has ; and it is a good thing that it has. 

In Plymouth, when the question was put before the 
town as to whether or not girls should be educated, one cf 
the great men of the toAvn arose with a great deal of 
puffing and blowing and said, " Educate girls ? No, no, 



84 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

no. I am opposed to educating girls. If we teach girls 
(and his nose turned up in scorn at the idea) they will be 
teachinij us and I should not like that. " 

I suppose the worthy man thought he had settled 
"girls" for all time. But girls then, as now, had a way of 
pushing ahead until they had, for their very own, all that 
belonged to them; and the Plymouth girls, in spite of the 
great man of the town, were voted the opportunity to 
receive one hour's instruction a day ; and in due time, as all 
little Plymouth boys and girls know, the schools were all 
opened to boys and girls alike. 

And in Boston, too, — just think of it! — when, in 
1825, Rev. John Pierpont succeeded in getting one of the 
High Schools opened for the girls, there was such an ex- 
citement over it, and so nmch objection to it that the good 
old man had to hide himself for fear of a mol:) ! 

Well, w^ell, these were strange times, weren't tliey, 
children? but you must rememl)er that the one thing al)ove 
all other things that history f^hould teach us is that the 
world arows wiser and wiser every year. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 85 



MASSACHUSETTS HARBOR. 

Nothing we are prouder of, nothing has helped more to 
make our state the important state that it is, than our 
grand old harbor. Massachusetts herself loves this har- 
bor and is proud of it, I am sure. Do you not see how 
lovingly and protectingly she throws her arm around it to 
shut oiF and break the fury of the great Atlantic storms that 
sweep towards our shores ? 

The Pilgrims were glad enough when their little bark 
crept in around the cape and made its Avay into the cosy 
little nook now called Plymouth Harbor. 

Just as glad, too, are the vessels of to-day — the great 
ocean steamers — to creep up through Massachusetts Bay 
into the harbor of Boston. 

There are many points of interest in our little Boston 
Harbor and many more along the vessel's course out 
through the Bay ; but as this little book can only give 
you a hint here and there of what our state has of interest 
for you, perhaps I cannot do better, since I can tell you 
but one story, to tell you about that strange block, that 
pyramid-shaped monument that stands outside our little 
harbor close in the line of the steamers. 



86 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 87 

If you ask your captain, very likely he will simply say, 
in the careless manner one does answer a question that has 
been asked him day in and day out hundreds and hundreds 
of times, " O, that's Nix's Mate." 

" Nix's Mate ! " you will say to yourself, looking at it 
again; "Nix's Mate!" The captain, had he tried, could 
hardly have given you a more meaningless answer. 

Now this black' looking island, upon which is raised 
this black-looking monument, was once a pretty, green, 
ocean island, like so many other of the pretty green spots 
down the harbor. 

Long ago, when pirates infested our shores, this island 
had upon it a high gallows upon which it was the custom to 
hang such pirates as might be caught and leave them there 
hanging that they might be a warning to all other pirates. 

Now there was, in these early days of the colony, a 
ship captain named Nix. One day he was found murdered 
in his berth. How it happened, when it was done, who did 
it, no one could find out. Days and days went by, and still 
no clue. Suspicion began to fall upon Nix's first mate. 
He seemed the one man who might be benefited by the 
death of Nix, in that he would, very likely, be promoted to 
a captainship. 

The poor mate was accused of the murder, and though 



88 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

he stoutly denied it, he was sentenced to be hanged upon 
this island. To be hanged was bad enough, innocent or 
guilty, but to be hanged here upon this island, the island 
dedicated to the punishment of miserable, thieving pirates, 
was cruel indeed. 

" I am innocent ! I swear before heaven I am inno- 
cent," plead poor Nix's mate. " God himself will bear wit- 
ness that I am innocent ; for I say, if I am hanged on this 
island, it shall come about that, to prove my innocence to 
the whole world, this island shall sink down and out of 
sight. So shall heaven give proof to you that you have 
stained your hands with the blood of an innocent man." 

Nevertheless, the unfortunate mate was hanged, and 
the story of Nix's murder was passing out of people's mind ; 
when one day, in passing the island, an old sea-captain said, 
" This island is sinking ; for years and years I have passed 
in and out of this harbor and I know that at this tide, the 
pirate island used to be larger, broader. See those rocks, 
that little point ! I tell you, shipmates, they are under 
water where once they used at this tide be high up, hardly 
dashed over by the surf even." 

Then the sailors began to watch. Month in and 
month out the passing seamen would eye the island sharply, 
saying to themselves," Indeed, the ocean bed is sinking here." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 89 

By-and-by an old sailor chanced to recall the pro- 
phecy of Nix's Mate so long before. Like wildfire, the 
story of Nix's Mate's prophecy went from ship to ship, 
from town to town throughout the colony. And supersti- 
tious as these simple people were, they looked with awe 
and reverence henceforth upon the gradually sinking 
island. " Sure enough, these were God's own proofs of 
the mate's innocence ; God's own answer to the mate's 
prayer that his innocence might be proved." 

The more the sailors looked at it, the more the island 
seemed to sink — weighed down, it seemed, by its weight of 
woe, its heavy disgrace. The time came at last when the 
island could be seen only at low tide. Then it became a point 
of dano^er in the harbor, and some sort of a siofnal must be 
built upon it to warn approaching vessels. So it came about 
that this pyramid, now black and water-worn, was placed 
there to stand forever a monument of the innocence of 
Nix's Mate and the unjust condemnation of the ship's crew. 




90 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




THE BUGLE CALL. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



91 




GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



THE BOYS' REDOUBT. 

OCTOBER, A. D., 1775. 

In continental Buff-and-Blue, 

With lappets richh^ laced, 
Beneath the shade the elm-trees made, 

A martial figure paced. 



92 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Along the sluggish Charles's banks 
He bent at length his way, 

Just as the gun, at set of sun, 
Went booming o'er the Bay. 

His soul was racked with doubt and strife, 
Despondence gloomed his eye ; 

He needs must bear his weight of care 
Out to the open sky. 

The breeze that flapped his soldier's cloak, 
The woods so broad and dim. 

The tides whose sway no bonds could stay, 
All seemed so free to him ! 

Yet the young nation that had wrung, 

Beyond the angry seas. 
From savage grace, a refuge-place, 

To pray as they might please, — 

Must it be hounded from its haunts ? 

Be fettered at the stake ? 
Be forced again to wear the chain 

It risked its all to break ? 

His step grew heavier with the thought, 
His lips less firm were set : 

It could not be that such as he 

Must yield ! — and yet — and yet — 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 93 

How could they ever hope to win 

A single light in lack 
Of everything, while England's king 

Had Europe at his back ? 

Thus musing sad beside the Charles, 

He saw the Cambridge boys, 
An eager band, pile up the sand 

With roar of riot noise. 

'' Ha ! lads, what do you here? " he said, 

Arrested by their shouts, 
" What do ive here? Why, give us cheer; 

We're building a redoubt ! 

*' Who knows how soon Lord Howe may come, 
And all his lion cubs. 
With growls and snarls, straight up the Charles, 
In his old British tubs ? 

*' And creeping from them in the dark. 
As quiet as a mouse. 
Now what if they should snatch awa}", 
Right out of ' Vassar House,' 

' ' Our new-made chief ; before a man 
Has leave to fire a gun ? 
That ends it ! For there'll be no war 
Without a Washington ! 



94 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

" Our fathers' hands are filled with work ; 
Besides, they're grieving still 
For Warren and the gallant band 
That fell at Bunker Hill. 

" So we will help them as we can ; 
You wear the Buff-and-Blue ; 
Yet we aver, we're ready, sir, 
To fight as well as you. 

" Maybe you're on the General's staff ; 
Then say we Cambridge bo3^s 
Will yell and shout from our redoubt 
With such a savage noise, 

" That all the vessels in the Bay 
Will hear the wild uproar. 
And swear again that Prescott's men 
Are lining all the shore ! " 

" Brave lads ! " the soldier said, and raised 

The cap that hid his brow ; 
" Some day, some day I'll surely pay 
The debt I owe you now ! 

*' Your high, heroic mettled hearts. 
Your faith that wavers not. 
To me are more than cannon's store, 
Or tons of shell or shot. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

** What people ever fails to gain 
The patriot's dearest prize, 
When ' die or vnn ' is blazing in 
The very children's eyes ? 

" No need to bear the General word 
Of tasks so rich in cheer : 
He makes his due salute to you, — 
You see the General here ! " 

— Margaret J. Preston. 



95 




WASHINGTON ELM. 



96 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 





BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 97 

CHARLESTOWN. 

Paved streets, horse cars, crowded brick l)locks of 
stores and dwellings — that is Charlestown. Close to 
Boston — foro^ettino- almost that it is not Boston — rushino:, 
driving, manufacturing, exporting — that is Charlestown, 
the Charlestown of to-day. Noisy, tiresome, like any 
other wide-awake, thriving New England city. 

But there was a Charlestown — this same Charlestown 
— years ago, full of interest and beauty. 

Let us pause here upon the bridge leading into the 
city and look upon it. See, there is Copp's Hill, from 
which some old records tell us Clinton and Burgoyne stood 
watching the battle of Bunker Plill. And there is Christ's 
Church, from which Gage himself watched the battle. 

That was a sad day l)oth to our little American army 
and to the proud British army. 

The war had really l)egun. Now there was no escape. 
Blood had ])een shed. War was inevitable. 

Great was the excitement when the news of the battle 
at Lexington and Concord had spread through the colonies. 
Meetings were called, armies were formed, everywhere 
men and women looked grave and anxious — all knew that 
long days of sadness and trouble were ahead for them. 



98 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

An army of fifteen thousand had been formed ; troops 
were coming every day from England, and every prepara- 
tion for war was ^roino- on. 

It was now near the middle of June. A detachment 
of soldiers had been sent to Charlestown to fortify Bunker 
Hill. Quietly, under cover of the darkness, they threw 
up the earth, forming ditches and forts, until, when morning 
dawned, there lay stretched along the side of the hill a long 
line of earthworks. 

"Look!" cried General Howe. "What is that the 
Americans have done ? Earthworks ! Preparation for 
encamping on that hill ! " 

"Turn the cannon upon them!" ordered the general. 
The cannon was turned upon them, but no harm could l)e 
done the earthworks so far away and so high up the hill- 
side . 

"A¥e must march up the hill ourselves," said the Ked- 
Coats. And soon a detachment of three thousand British 
began the march against the colonists. O, this was a sad, 
sad day for Boston ! Here was a genuine, regular battle — 
army against army. 

Engerly, anxiously did the Americans watch from 
behind their embankments. 

Slowly up the hill the troops advanced, firing at every 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 99 

step. "Boys," cried General Prescott, "you know we have 
no powder to waste ; don't fire until you can see the whites 
of their eyes." 

"Not very much alive," thought the English, as they 
received no shot in return for their own. 

But we know how very, very much alive were the 
l)rave Americans within the fort. Other plans had they of 
which the British were soon to learn. 

And now the Red-Coats were nearly upon the earth- 
works. Their great plumes nodded and waved — close 
within the sight of the Americans. 

" Ready now," said Prescott, in a low tone of command. 
" Fire ! " Bang ! bang 1 snap ! whir ! bang ! bang ! The 
Americans were alive now — alive and wide-awake. 

The British soldiers fell like grain before the scythe. 
On pressed the ranks over the dead and the wounded, on, 
on, to the earthworks. Again out-blazed the muskets from 
within the fort. Again fell great lines of British soldiers. 

For a time hope rose high — hope that the British 
were driven back, hope that the battle was ended. But 
again the British rallied. One mighty rush onward over 
the heaped up dead, over the intrenchments, into the very 
fortress — and the British had won the day. 

This was the first re£:ular battle of the Revolution. 



100 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




DEFENCE OF BREED'S HILL. 

General Prescott in the Redoubt. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 101 

It was a defeat, a sad defeat for the American arnay ; still, 
in many ways it had all the glory of a success. It had 
been a dearly won victory to the British ; it had taught the 
British that America was not to be subdued by simple 
threats; it had taught the colonists courage, zeal, faith in 
their own powers ; had their powder not given out in the 
third assault, they knew the victory would have been theirs. 
And so, though the British counted it a victory, there was 
no feeling of discouragement among the colonists. 

But no shadow of this sad battle now lies upon the 
hill. All this was long, long ago, and to-day the quiet, 
peaceful, grass-covered hill speaks only of peace and pros- 
perity. The tall shaft that looks out calmly and bravely 
over the city and out over the great harbor is the only 
reminder of what has been. 

The day of the laying of the corner-stone of this great 
monument was, I suppose, the greatest day in Charles- 
town history, — excepting, of course, the day of the battle. 

On this day, again the streets of Boston and of 
Charlestown were thronged with people ; again upon the 
house-tops the people gathered. Bat this time all was so 
different, — no fear and dread to-day, — all joy and happy 
anticipation. 

The American army is not crouching in terror behind 



102 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

the breast-works, awaiting what may prove a deadly battle. 
Just see them on this day ! There they come across the 
bridge, bands playing, flags flying, the soldiers strong 
and erect, beautiful in their rich uniforms and gay plumes. 




DANIEL WEBSTER. 



In the procession are LaFayette, the French friend of our 
army, — and Webster, who is to deliver the oration. 

How the people cheer and shout and wave I Cheers 
for LaFayette ! Cheers for Webster ! But a hush falls 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 103 

upon the crowd. Here in the procession is a little group 
of men, — old men, old and bent. Can it be — yes, it is 
true, — these are the soldiers of Bunker Hill, — all that are 
left. Now hear the cheers ! How they ring out till the 
very skies reverberate with the sound. Veterans of the 
battle of Bunker Hill ! Veterans of the battle of Bunker 
Hill ! Such a day as this was for Charlestown, June 17, 
1825, a day never to be lost in our American history. 

Webster'^ oration ! how familiar it is ! Can you not 
almost imagine you hear him as, with majestic presence, 
he stands before the assembled people, and speaks those 
great and memorable words, which shall never die : — 

" Let the sacred obligations which have devolved on this generation, 
and on us, sink deep into our hearts. Those who established our liberty 
and our government are daily dropping from among us. The great trust 

now descends to new hands We can win no laurels in a war 

for independence. Earlier and worthier hands have gathered them all. 
. . . But there remains to us a great duty of defence and preservation ; 
and there is opened to us, also, a noble pursuit, to which the spirit of the 
times strongly invites us. Our proper business is improvement. In a 
day of peace, let us advance the arts of peace and the works of peace. 
Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up 
its institutions, promote all its great interests and see whether we also, 
in our day and generation, may not perform something to be remembered. 
. . , . Let our object be, ouk country, our whole country and 
NOTHING BUT OUR COUNTRY. And, by the blessing of God, may that 
country itself become a vast and splendid monument, not of oppression 
and terror, but of Wisdom, of Peace, and of Liberty, upon which the 
world may gaze with admiration forever." 



104 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 105 



SOMERVILLE. 

BURNING OF THE CONVENT. 

Somerville, one of Boston's largest suburban cities, 
though wide-awake to business, flourishing in trade, hirge 
in numbers of intelligent, enterprising citizens, and noted 
for its excellent schools, is not — even its proudest resident 
would not say it — an especially picturesque city, nor a city 
of romantic or legendary wealth. 

Only one spot, I believe, do the Somerville people 
point out to the stranger as a point of storied interest. 
And even that, as it looks now, invaded as it is by gravel 
diggers and ledge blasters, presents anything but a romantic 
appearance. 

Upon this hill there stood, long ago, the Benedictine 
Convent. It was a stately building, so the people say who 
remember it, standing, as it must have done, clear and 
sharp against the eastern sky. 

Within this convent, under the direction of a wise and 
good Sister Superior, dwelt a happy little l)and of nuns ; 
and to these nuns, year after year, came young maidens from 
far and near to study under the guidance of these teachers. 

For a long time the convent grew in good repute 



106 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

throughout the country. The teachers were wise and kind 
and good ; the pupils happy and contented. 

But one day there came to one of the teachers, — a 
beautiful, pale faced nun, — an evil spirit — so the people 
said . 

Such strange things as she said, and her eyes, filled 
with a strange, new light, flashed Are — real fire, so her 
excited pupils afterward said. 

Poor, innocent little nun ! If only they had known 
and could have given her the care she needed ! But they 
did not know, and at high noon she rushed from the con- 
vent, down into the village, crying, «' Save me, save me! 
They are murdering me ! they are murdering me ! " 

It required very little in those early days of our his- 
tory to excite the populace ; very, very little, and by night- 
time the town of Somerville was in a frenzy of excitement. 
" A nun has escaped ! A nun has escaped ! " they whispered 
each to each. " And such terrible stories as she tells — of 
cruelty and starvation, of imprisonment, of murder, even ! " 

"Poor little nun, poor little nun ! " they said, shaking 
their heads mysteriously. " She herself had been starved, 
had been cruelly whipped. She had been imprisoned. She 
was stolen from her home and imprisoned in this convent 
by a cruel brother who wanted her property — by a wicked 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 107 

father, who was angry that she would not marry her cousin 
and thus preserve the family estate — by a revengeful lover 
who had said in a tragic voice : ' If you will not marry me 
you shall die a living death. You shall be the wife of none 
other ! ' " 

And so the stories accumulated. And the poor, inno- 
cent little nun, suffering as she was from delirium and 
fever, was made the much-abused heroine of wicked plots 
and crimes, at which, could she but have known, the gentle 
little lady would have smiled sadly and sweetly, and have 
said, as was her habit: "Nay, nay, dear friends; quiet, 
quiet — that is best for us all." 

By-and-by the mob was aroused. "Down with the 
convent ! down with the convent ! " they cried. And one 
night, a dark, 1)lack night, they rushed, a great mob of 
excited men and boys, up the great hill to the convent 
doors. " Fire the convent ! Fire the convent ! Death to 
the inmates ! Death to the inmates ! Drag out the Sister 
Superior ! Burn her alive, hang her ! Death to her ! 
Death to the Sister Su])erior ! " they yelled. 

Bravely and quietly the Sister Superior gathered her 
teachers and her frightened pupils a))out her. "Be brave," 
she said, "be quiet. Follow me ; do not be afraid." And 
so she led her little band out from the convent down the 



108 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

hill, through the deep shadows, out at last into the village, 
to the sheltering homes of the people. 

How the mol) yelled and howled ! How they thun- 
dered at the great doors of the convent ! Hear the 
crashing of the great windows ! Hear their clubs and axes 
against the great oaken doors ! Down they fall across 
the great halls, and in rushes the infuriated mob. On, on 
they rush from room to room, from hall to hall, stealing, 
rol)bing, destroying as they go. And now "Burn the 
Convent ! Burn the Convent ! " is the cry of the excited 
mob ; and some great flames leap out, great clouds of 
black smoke ; the sky for miles about is red as with a 
sunset glow. People from the towns about rush out into 
the streets to wonder what it means. There on the high 
hill, looking down upon the beautiful Mystic River, out 
upon the great, quiet harbor, l)lazecl and burned the noble 
old l)uilding, the Benedictine Convent. 

The morning sun rose upon no sadder sight than the 
great staring ruins, the blackened, broken walls of the 
convent. 

For years the ruins stood there looking down upon 
the town, sad, as ruins always are, l)eautiful, almost grand, 
as in the night the moon shone through the great, open 
windows and down u])on the roofless structure. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 109 

As the years passed, it grew more and more beautiful 
in its neglect; for shrubs and trees grew up about it, vines 
and ivies crept over its walls, and people passing would 
say, "It is like an old English ruin." 

But by-and-by the hill upon which it stood passed into 
other hands. The spirit of progress seized upon it. 
*' With its blocks of stone we will pave our streets," said 
the progressive, energetic, practical city fathers; and little 
by little the ruins faded away, little by little even the hill 
itself faded away ; and to-day, the stranger, gazing upon a 
great wall of gravel and listening to the whir of the busy 
engines, would have, I fear, to stretch his imagination far, 
very far, to realize that once this hill was beautiful, and 
that so romantic a history hovers about it. 




110 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



THE OLD POWDER-HOUSE. 

Within the limits of Somerville, and upon an eminence 
formerly called Quarry Hill, stands the Old Powder-House, 
a conspicuous object for miles around. This powder- 
house prides itself upon being the only ancient ruin in 
Massachusetts, though just how old it is we do not 
know. 

However, John Mallet, its first owner, built it before 
1720, never thinking that long after he was gone it would 
be used to store powder in. Indeed, his only intention was 
to erect a wind mill, where he could grind corn for the 
neighboring farmers and anyone else who chose to come 
that far ; and I haven't a doubt but that many and many a 
good grist of meal was carried away from it to be made into 
johnny-cake for the Yankee lads and lassies. 

After John Mallet died, his two sons carried on the 
business very prosperously; but in 1747 the old miller's 
grandson, Isaac, sold the mill to the province of Massachu- 
setts for "£250 in bills of public credit of the old tenor." 
These bills were a certain form of paper money issued by the 
colonial government and called " the old tenor," to distin- 
guish them from other issues made at difterent periods, and 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. Ill 

known respectively as " the new tenor " and " the middle 
tenor." The old wind-mill was now remodeled, though 
probably not many changes were needed, as it was originally 
built of stone from the neighboring quarries, and was quite 
large enough to hold a goodly store of ammunition. At that 
time, or afterwards, the space within was divided into three 
stories, separated by heavy floors supported by large oaken 
joists. So you may see how substantial the work was, and 
how well calculated to resist the wear and tear of nearly 
two centuries. 

After the old mill was changed into a magazine for 
storing the powder for the province and the towns, it was 
used for that purpose by the American forces during the 
siege of Boston, and by the State of Massachusetts till 
1822, a few years after the magazine at Cambridgeport 
was completed. 

Now, if John Mallet's mill had never been used for 
anything but grinding corn, we should probably have heard 
little about it ; but because of the new use it was put to, it 
was indirectly the cause of the first armed gathering of the 
men of Middlesex County. 

For just at the beginning of the Revolution, when the 
colonists began to look forward to the coming conflict and 
prepare for it, they decided to withdraw, little by little. 



112 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

the powder belonging to the towns and hide it away from 
the prying eyes of the Tories. 

But General Gage learned what was going on and 
resolved to get possession of all that was left. So one 
morning at sunrise, Lieutenant-Colonel Maddison, with two 
hundred and sixty men, embarked from Long Wharf and 
rowed swiftly across the harbor to a convenient landing- 
place. Leaving the boats, one detachment marched to 
Cambridge and took possession of two cannon, while the 
rest of the men proceeded to the Old Powder-House and 
carried away the two hundred and fifty half l)arrels of 
powder which were still stored there. 

You can imagine how angry the people were ! So 
ano^ry, that large numbers of them armed and gathered 
too^ether on Cambridge common, and the only wonder is 
that they did not start out to fight the Ked-Coats that very 
day. Later on they took part in the struggle manfully, 
and probably used some of that very ammunition they had 
so wisely removed from the mill. 

After the Revolution, the Old Powder-House was 
aofain used as a mas^azine until 1836, when the State 
disposed of it to private parties, Avhose heirs still retain 
possession of this revolutionary landmark. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 113 



HISTORIC CHELSEA. 

Cities lying close about a metropolis — seeming almost 
a part of that metropolis, cannot, although larger and vastly 
more important, inspire in the mere traveler the interest 
that is awakened by many a little simple country village. 
Such cities are not beautiful — they cannot be. They are 
too busy. The streets must l)e paved ; l^uildings must be 
crowded close together ; CA^ery inch of land must be utilized 
— at least, so the business world declares. 

But Chelsea comes very close to proving an exception. 
"Dead as Chelsea," is a phrase that sometime or other has 
fastened itself upon this city. But wdiere the consistency 
lies one may Avonder indeed. For a busier, more bustling, 
more thoroughly alive city is not to l)e found about Boston. 

Chelsea has, moreover, a really beautiful section. 
Powder Horn Hill, so named from ha vino; been bought from 
the Indians for a horn of pow^der, is a l)eautiful elevation 
overlooking the city and the bay. On the hill stands the 
Soldiers' Home, the flag over which can be seen far out 
from the harbor. 

And there are historical spots as well. Not far from 
the depot, near Chelsea Creek, stands the Newgate House. 



114 STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

In 1774 the British troops around Boston commenced 
foraging for supplies. All the coast from Quincy to Lynn 
was their object. In May, 1775, just five weeks after the 
battle of Lexington, the British perceived that the patriots 
were removing supplies from Noddle's Island and Hog 
Island to the mainland . To cut off their return the sloop 
Diana was ordered up Chelsea Creek. At the Newgate 
House a sharp conflict took place, the house itself receiv- 
ing from the sloop several bullet shots. Putnam was here 
from Cambridge, and Stark and Dear])orn and General War- 
ren, and from eight hundred to one thousand patriots, with 
two cannons and plenty of ammunition. The Americans 
repelled the attack, and the Diana was driven off. The 
patriots succeeded in getting five hundred sheep to this 
place, some on the Powder Horn Hill side of the creek and 
some on the Newgate side, whence they were all driven in- 
land out of the reach of the British. This was, then, so the 
Chelsea people will proudly claim, the second l^attle of the 
American Kevolution. 

This policy of the Bostonians made food and fuel very 
scarce for the British. In less than ten months, aided by 
the /(uns of Washington at Dorchester Heights, it compelled 
the ijritish admiral to pack his troops into his heavy ships, 
sa good-bye to Boston, and sail for Halifax. The Newgate 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 115 

house, it is believed, stands to-day, as it was first erected, 
in 1680, perhaps in 1650 — a hirge wooden buikling with 
an immense chinnie3% and a roof sloping in the rear almost 
to the ground. 

Then this is the hill which was once the property of 
Sir Henry Yane. 

It was in 1635 that Sir Henry came to Boston. He 
was a young man then — only about twenty-three years old. 
He was a broadly educated man for his times, had traveled, 
was of noble family, and was well schooled in politics and 
statesmanship. 

Only a few months after his arrival, he was made gov- 
ernor, and so wisely and so well did he administer aftairs 
that his name stands in history side by side with that of 
John Winthrop, who was, you remember, the first governor 
of this Massachusetts colony. 

Vane's brave stand in regard to the religious persecu- 
tion of the Quakers was one of the noblest memories we 
have of him ; but the colonists at that time did not quite 
recognize the nobility, I fear; and when l)ecause of this he 
failed to receive his election as governor, he returned to 
England. 

In England he became an active leader against the 
rising power of Cromwell. He was in everything an 



116 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

apostle of liberty, and like most such apostles in these 
times, he was, by-and-by, accused of treason, was tried, 
condemned and executed. 

On the summit of the hill which was owned by Sir 
Henry Vane, in what is now Chelsea, stands the great 
Revere Reservoir. 

From the western slope of this hill, we get a tine view 
of a beautiful valley with a little hill beyond. 

In this valley is a plentiful supply of cedar trees, over 
the roots of which a little stream tilled with cold springs 
makes its way. This is the Mount Washington spring 
water. There lies one of the most beautifiil spots around 
Boston. Up and down in it, Indian stone implements 
have repeatedly been found. This was one of the abodes 
of the red men whenever, at certain seasons, they made 
their way to the salt water. The little hill used to be 
called Sagamore Hill, a name not unfrequently met with. 

A little further on towards Boston a sharp curve in 
the road brings us to another old mansion standing 
near by. This is the historical farmhouse of Sir Henry 
Vane. A few rods to the east is another cold, l)ubbling 
spring — the white men, as well as the Indians, in their 
abodes, appreciating the benefits of a bountiful sup})ly of 
good water. When, in 1G88, Dr. Increase Mather wished 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 117 

to get away from Andros's tyranny in Boston, and Andros 
thought he had the exits sufficiently guarded to prevent 
his leaving, Mather came by night through Charlestown, 
reached this house, was conducted from it by boat to a 
vessel, the President, which, lying outside for him, took 
him to England. 

The grounds of the United States Hospital were 
once the estate of Gen. Bellingham, whose name is still 
prominent among the Chelsea names. In his will, Bel- 
lingham left the whole estate to be devoted to religious 
purposes. But the Avill was contested by the town ; and 
after a contest of one hundred and fourteen years the town 
won the case. 

The very schools of Chelsea have historical names — 
some of them being named from the four great farms into 
which the Bellingham estate w^as divided : the Carey, the 
Shurtleff, the Agassiz, and the Williams. 

Powder Horn Hill and the lands near by, in the Revo- 
lution, formed the site of the left wing of Washington's 
army during the siege of Boston. The marshes to the east 
prevented the British from landing there. Washington, 
while he was estal^lished at Cambridge, honored Chelsea 
with a visit, and was entertained at the foot of Sagamore 
Hill (now Mount Washington). 



118 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The Diana, after the conflict at the Newgate house, 
proceeded to a place near the ferry, where she became 
entangled. There she fired some shot, which went over 
Powder Horn Hill. The masts of this vessel, and some of 
the shot came, in the course of time, into the possession 
of Isaac Pratt, who died a few years ago, an old and well- 
known Chelsea resident. 

So, you see, Chelsea, after all, has quite as many 
points of interest as has Charlestown ; and Old Powder 
Horn Hill, even if the British did not see fit to make it a 
scene of actual battle, may well hold its head as proudly as 
its sister hill in its sister town, above which towers the great 
monument of Bunker Hill. 



With smoking axle, hot with speed, with steeds of fire and steam, 
Wide- waked To-day leaves Yesterday behind him like a dream. 
Still, from the hurryiug train of Life, fly backward far and fast 
The milestones of the fathers, the landmarks of the past. 

— J. G. Whittier. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 119 



ROXBURY PUDDING STONE. 

There is, in and about Roxbuiy, so all Roxbury chil- 
dren could tell you, a strange sort of stone, clay-like in its 
appearance, and that clay stuffed full of little round stones 
like pebl)les. It looks so much like a petrified pudding, 
brimful of petrified plums, that it has been given the name 
of Roxbury Pudding Stone. 

Somebody away back in colonial days made up a story 
about it which I would tell 3^ou, were it not that Oliver 
Wendell Holmes has put it into rhyme so much more 
perfectly than any one else could put it into prose, that it 
will be far better to let him tell it to you in his own words. 

THE DORCHESTER GIANT. 

There was a giant in time of old, 

A mighty one was he ; 
He had a wife, but she was a scold. 
So he kept her shut in his mammoth fold ; 

And he had children three. 

It happened to be an election day, 

And the giants Avere choosing a king ; 
The people were not democrats then, 



120 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

They did not talk of the rights of men, 
And all that sort of thing. 

Then the giant took his children three 

And fastened them ni the pen ; 
The children roared ; quoth the giant, " Be still ! " 
And Dorchester Heights and Milton Hill 

Rolled back the sound again. 

Then he brought them a pudding stuffed with plums, 
As big as the State House dome ; 

Quoth he, " There's something for you to eat ; 

So stop your mouths with your 'lection treat, 
And wait till your dad comes home." 

So the giant pulled him a chestnut stout, 

And whittled the boughs away ; 
The boys and their mother set up a shout ; 
Said he, " You're in and you can't get out, 

Bellow as loud as you may." 

Off he went, and he growled a tune 

As he strolled the fields along ; 
'Tis said a buffalo fainted away. 
And fell as cold as a lump of clay. 

When he heard the giant's song. 

But whether the story's true or not. 

It's not for me to show ; 
There's many a thing that's twice as queer, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 121 

In somebody's lectures that we hear, 
And those are true, you know. 



What are those lone ones doing now, 
The wife and the children sad ? 

O ! they are in a terrible rout, 

Screaming, and throwing their pudding about, 
Acting as they were mad. 

They flung it over to Roxbury hills. 

They flung it over the plain, 
And all over Milton and Dorchester, too 
Great lumps of pudding the giants threw ! 

They tumbled as thick as rain. 



Giant and mammoth have passed away, 

For ages have floated by ; 
The suet is hard as a marrow-bone. 
And every plum is turned to a stone, 

But there the puddings lie. 

And if, some pleasant afternoon. 

You'll ask me out to ride. 
The whole of the story I will tell, 
And you shall see where the puddings fell. 

And pay for the treat beside. 



i»i 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 123 



LEXINGTON. 

Lexington ! The first of American battlefields ! 

I suppose no little Massachusetts ])oy or girl but has 
heard of the battle of Lexington ; still I will venture to 
speak once more of it. Indeed, it would be strange to 
pass this village hy, this beautiful Lexington, without a 
tribute to its beauty and its history. 

Standing upon the village green, one could almost 
imagine himself back in the old Revolutionary days. 
Indeed, they do say — people who know, — that this vil- 
lage has changed only a very little in all the century that 
has followed. 

There stand the old, old taverns, there the old house, 
with the very bullet holes w hich on that sad day were made 
by the British soldiers, there the very blacksmith shop, if 
one may judge from its color and ancient look. 

It is a wondrously peaceful village — as peaceful as 
dear old Concord — and not one trace or shadow of the 
sad, dark day of so long ago. 

But let us read again the story of that day. 

It Avas in the spring of 1775, that General Gage, the 
British officer, began suspecting that in or about Lexington 



124 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

the Americans were storing away military supplies of gun- 
powder, muskets, bullets. 

Eumors, too, were heard of " minute men" who were 
drilling in and about Boston. Minute-men they called them- 
selves, because they pledged themselves to be ready at a 
minute's notice to hurry into the field when called for 
battle. 

It was some time before Gen. Gage could be sure where 
the stores were secreted ; l)ut at last some Tories — the 
Tories, you rememl^er, were colonists not in favor of rebel- 
ling against the king — discovered the place and reported 
to Gage. 

The minute-men, in some way, suspected that Gage had 
been told, and that he was preparing for an attack upon 
the place. They, too, were accordingly on the watch. 

On the evening of April 18, 1775, the patriots, who 
were on the watch from the church towers over-looking the 
water, saw a movement among the British soldiers. 

'^They are preparing to set forth," said the sentinels. 

Now, over upon the other side of the water, waiting for 
a signal from the tower of the Old North Church in Boston, 
stood Paul Revere, ready at a signal to ride out through 
the Middlesex villages and farms, to warn the minute-men 
to be up and to arm. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 125 

If the British set forth by land, there was to be hung 
out from the Old North Church tower one lantern — if, by 
water, two were to flash forth. 

And in the poem of Paul Revere by our good Long- 
fellow, you know the story is told in the following beauti- 
ful Avords : — 

PAUL REVERE'S RIDE. 

Listen, my children, and you shall hear 

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere. 

On the eighteenth of April in 'Seventy-five ; 

Hardly a man is now alive 

Who remembers that famous day and year. 

He said to his friend, " If the British march 
By land or sea from the town to-night. 
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch 
Of the North Church tower as a signal light, — 
One if by land, and two if by sea, 
And I on the opposite shore will be, 
Ready to ride and spread the alarm 
Through every Middlesex village and farm, 
For the country-folk to be up and to arm." 

Then he said " good night ! " and with muffled oar 
Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore. 
Just as the moon rose over the bay. 
Where swinghig wide at her moorings lay 



126 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The Somerset, British-man-of-war ; 

A phantom ship, with each mast and spar 

Across the moon like a prison bar, 

And a huge black hulk that was magnified 

By its own reflection in the tide. 

Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, 

Wanders and watches with eager ears. 

Till in the silence around him he hears 

The muster of m.en at the barrack door. 

The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, 

And the measured tread of the grenadiers 

Marching down to their boats on the shore. 

Then he climbed to the tower of the Church, 
Up the w^ooden stairs with stealthy tread, 
To the belfry chamber overhead. 
And startled the pigeons from their perch. 
On the sombre rafters, that round him made 
Masses and moving shapes of shade, — 
Up the light ladder, slender and tall, 
To the highest window in the wall. 
Where he paused to listen and look down 
A moment on the roofs of the town, 
And the moonlight flowing over all 



Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride, 
Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride 
On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere. 
Now he patted his horse's side, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 127 

Now gazed at the landscape far and near, 
Then, impetuous, stamped the earth. 
And turned and tightened his saddle girth : 
But mostly he watched with eager search 
The belfry-tower of the Old North Church, 
As it rose above the graves on the hill, 
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still. 

And lo ! as he looks, on the belfry's height 
A glimmer and then a gleam of light ! 
He springs, to the saddle, the bridle he turns, 
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight 

A second lamp in the belfry burns . 

A hurry of hoofs in a village street, 

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark. 

And beneath from the pebbles, in passing, a spark 

Struck out by a steed that flies fearless and fleet : 

That was all ! And yet through the gloom and the light, 

The fate of a nation was riding that night ; 



It was twelve by the village clock 

When he crossed the bridge into Medford town. 

He heard the crowing of the cock. 

And the barking of the farmer's dog. 

And felt the damp of the river fog 

That rises after the sun goes down. 



128 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

It was one by the village clock, 

When he rode into Lexington. 

He saw the gilded weathercock 

Swim in the moonlight as he passed, 

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare, 

Gaze at him with a spectral glare, 

As if they already stood aghast 

At the bloody work they would look upon. 

It was two by the village clock, 

When he came to the bridge in Concord town. 

He heard the bleating of the flock, 

And the twitter of birds among the trees. 

And felt the breath of the morning breeze 

Blowino: over the meadows brown. 



So through the night rode Paul Revere ; 

And so through the night went his cry of alarm 

To every Middlesex village and farm, — 

A cry of defiance and not of fear, 

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door. 

And a word that shall echo for evermore ! 

For, borne on the night-wind of the Past, 

Through all our history, to the last. 

In the hour of darkness and peril and need 

The people will waken and listen to hear 

The hurrying hoof- beats of that steed. 

And the midnight message of Paul Revere. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 129 

At Lexington, the advancing British army was met by 
a brave little band of farmers, ready to fight and to die for 
their homes and their families. 

" Disperse, ye rebels," cried the leaders of the British 
troops. 

But the brave farmer-soldiers stood firm. 

" Curses upon the obstinacy of these colonists," mut- 
tered an officer; "they should be taught a lesson," said he, 
discharo^ino- a musket into their ranks. 

Instantly the fire was returned by the farmers. 

And now out blazed a volley from the British troops. 
The war of the Revolution had besfun. Eisrht brave farmer- 
soldiers lay dead upon the ground. 

This was the first bloodshed of the Revolution. There 
upon the grass of the beautiful green lay the dead ])odies 
of eight brave minute-men — the first martyrs in the cause 
of American li])erty. 

From Lexington, the British troops passed on to Con- 
cord — to the place where the stores of military supplies 
were hidden. 

The troops had little trouble in finding these supplies 
— indeed, so directly to the store-houses did they march, 
that it was said they must have been guided by some 
American — some Tory — who knew far better than the 



130 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

British soldiers could have known, the secrets of the 
American army. 

In a few short minutes the stores were dragged forth, 
the flour which had been hidden there for future need 
rolled into the river, the cannon spiked, the gun carriages 
set on fire, the guns and powder distributed among the 
British soldiers, to be added to their own store. 

But the Concord minute-men were not idle all this 
time. On the bridge — old Concord bridge ! — the minute- 
men had mustered to resist the British troops. " The 
cowards ! " cried a British officer as he saw them there. 
"Fire!" ordered he. Two Americans fell beneath the 
charge. One second, and out blazed the American guns. 
The British, surprised, frightened, fell back. The Ameri- 
cans followed close with another charge. The British 
turned and fled. "They run, they run!" screamed the 
colonists ; and on they followed, shouting and firing, the 
Red-Coats dropping beneath the fire, at every step. Pell- 
mell, helter-skelter, all order lost, they turned and ran, yes, 
ran — back towards Lexington. On followed the patriots. 
From every house, every barn, from behind every tree and 
bush, cracked the muskets of the Americans. Along the 
road, here, there, everywhere, fell the British beneath the 
tire. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 131 

On fled the British into Lexington. There they met 
Lord Percy, sent out from Boston with fresh troops. But 
he came too kite. And so, forming a hollow square around 
the defeated men, who, panting with fatigue and thirst, 
dropped almost lifeless upon the ground, their tongues 
hanging out like dogs, he stood there protecting them 
until they had recovered breath and were able to march on 
again. 

Thus Percy led the British ti'oops back to Boston, and 
the Americans were left victors in this the first battle of 
the Ee volution, which took place in Concord and Lexing- 
ton April 19, 1775. 



By the rude bridge that arched the flood, 
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, 

Here once the embattled farmers stood, 
And fired the shot heard round the world. 

The foe long since in silence slept ; 

Alike tlie conqueror silent sleeps ; 
And Time the ruined bridge has swept, 

Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. 



R. W. Emerson. 



132 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




HOME OF EMERSON, (OullCOrd). 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 133 



OLD CONCORD. 

Not only has Concord this grand okl historic impor- 
tance in our State, Imt it is full of memories of the noblest 
and l)est, the purest and sweetest of our American authors 
— Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, the Alcotts. 

Such a beautiful, restful i)hice as it is in the summer 
time I And so many places of interest ! One knows not 
where to ])egin, nor where to end, in telling you of this dear 
old town. 

The name — Concord — was given the settlement in its 
beginning, from the very happy manner in which the pur- 
chase of the land was carried on with the Indian owners, 
and from the peaceful relations then and always between 
the Indians and the white settlers. 

In the old church which stood upon, or quite near the 
site of the present Unitarian church, — which glories, by 
the way, in being built from the timbers of the old church, 
— in this old church was held the first provincial congress ; 
in it, too, was John Hancock chosen president. 

The Old Hill Burying Ground — one of the oldest in 
the country — has many old, Aveather-beaten stones, bear- 
ing dates as early as 1677. In this burial-ground is the 



134 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

grave of Major John Buttrick, who led the fight at the Old 
North Bridge. 

But of more interest still is the " Sleepy Hollow" 
burial ground. Here, marked by a simple white stone 
bearing the one word Hawthorne, lies the author, Avho 
with all his other writing and studying and thinking, found 
time to write so much that was so beautiful for you 
children — the "Wonder Book," "Grandfather's Chair," 
and so many dear little stories, like "The Snow Image " — 
all in the purest, sweetest language, fall of life and 
interest. Read them, children ; they will do you good. 

Near by the grave of Hawthorne is the grave of 
Thoreau, the man who loved the flowers, the sky, the 
birds, the water, the trees, as never man loved nature 
before or since ; who saw in each such wondrous beauty* 
such worlds of story, such lessons, so grand, so loving, so 
tender and true ! 

Then, not far away, is the grave of Emerson, the 
gentle, wise philosopher, and by his side the grave of the 
little son, on whose death the father wrote the beautiful 
poem " Threnody." 

Then, there are in the town so many houses of historic 
or literary interest. 

There is the old " Wright Tavern, " at which, on the 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 135 

march from Lexington to Concord, Mjijor Pitcairn stopped 
and rested, saying, as he stirred his brandy, "Ah, my good 




KALPH WALDO EMERSON. 



men ; we'll stir before night-fall the rebel blood." But 
this boasting remark, you will remember, was made early 
in the day, before he had dreamed that he should be 



136 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

pursued, runnini>-, i){inting like a dog, from Concord to 
Lexington and from Lexington to Charlestown. 

There is the beautiful old home of Emerson, with its 
grove of pine trees and tall chestnut trees, which con- 
ceal the front and side of the house from the street. 

The Old Manse, Hawthorne's home, is a grand old 
house, approached by a l)eautiful, long avenue of great 
trees. Here Hawthorne dreamed his beautiful dreams and 
wrote his beautiful stories. 

"The Wayside," the later home of Hawthorne, a little 
out from the village, has a beautiful hedge of low- 
branching trees. Behind the house a low, sloping ridge 
of land glories in its historical fame as a ridge from 
which the patriotic farmer soldiers poured down their lire 
upon the retreating Britishers. 

But on this ridge, more beautiful still, I cannot but 
think, is a beautiful little path through a tangle of trees 
and underbrush, up and down which Hawthorne used to 
walk and think out the pages of his wonderful books. 

On Lake Walden stood the little hut in which Thorenu 
spent so many happy years ! Beautiful Lake Walden ! 
Read, some time, children, the delicate, gentle, beautiful 
lines that Thoreau has written of this perfect lake. 

Then the Alcott home — "The Orchard House" — 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



137 




138 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

where your pet author, girls, spent so much of her life, 
stands a little beyond the Wayside. 

This is an old house, not so large and roomy, nor so 
suggestive of old, old times as those of Hawthorne and 
Emerson, but one which to you just now would be fuller 
of interest than all the rest. Yes, here it was the little 
Louisa Alcott grew good and wise and kind and loving, so 
that by-and-by she could write the beautiful books — "Little 
Men " and " Little Women " — that you all so love to read. 

But we must come away from this fascinating little 
town. We might read on and on all day, or, if you were 
there, you might ride about for days and then not see half 
the places of interest or hear half the beautiful stories of 
its history, its houses, its people. 

Just one glance at the quiet, deep, dark river — the 
Concord River — and we must — we must leave thi^ 
beautiful place. 

Thoreau wrote of this river ; Hawthorne lo^^ed to touch 
upon its beauties, its quiet, its peacefulness, in his lines. 

Hear what one writer has to say of a day spent upon 
this river : — " It might have been our day on the river that 
Hawthorne wrote about. For us, too, 'the winding 
course of the stream continually shut out the scene behind 
us and revealed as calm and lovely a one before. We 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



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HENRY DAVID THOKEAU. 







STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 141 

glided from depth to depth, and breathed new seclusion at 
every turn. The sky kingfisher flew from the withered 
branch close at hand to another at a distance, uttering a 
shrill cry of anger and alarm. Ducks that had been float- 
ing there since the preceding eve were startled at our 
approach, and skimmed along the grassy river, breaking 
its dark surface with a bright streak. The turtle, sunning 
itself upon a rock or at the root of a tree, slid suddenly 
into the water with a plunge.' But we saw one congrega- 
tion of seven turtles on a fallen tree out in the river, and 
they went on sunning themselves and never minded us at 
all, but disappeared in a flash, or rather in seven flashes, 
when a boat-load of boys paddled up to them with a whoop 
of delight. 

"Like Hawthorne, we too found in July the prophesy 
of autumn. A few tall maples were the color of the purple 
beech, a rare color for maples to take on, and fallen 
crimson leaves flecked the water here and there, and the 
golden rods were marshalled in stately ranks just ready to 
unfold their superb yellow plumes ; and with all the peace 
and beauty came, too, the 'half-acknowledged melancholy,' 
the feeling 'that Time has now given us all his flowers, 
and that the next work of his never idle fingers must be 
to steal them one by one away.' " 



142 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



DUNSTABLE. 



Away up close to the New Hampshire line, only a 
few miles from old Concord, lies the quiet, white little village 
of Dunstable. Such a pretty little village, so still, so 
peaceful, so happy and prosperous ! 

This little town was settled by Capt. Brattle, who 
obtained for himself a grant of land of some sixteen hun- 
dred acres, the land upon which now is built the village 
of Dunstable. For several years this tract of land w^as 
known only as "Brattle Farm," but in 1673, so many 
families had gathered within its limits that, at petition of its 
people, the General Court made it an incorporated town. 

The land was carefully surveyed by Jonathan Dan- 
forth, the great surveyor of that colonial time, of w^hom the 
colonists were proud to say 

' ' He rode the circuit, chained great towns and farms, 
To good behavior ; and by well-marked stations, 
He fixed their bounds for many generations." 

These early colonists, perhaps you already know, were 
very fond of rhyme, though they knew very little of 
poetry. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 143 

Perhaps you would like to hear his description of his 
survey — the written document — which then, as now, it was 
the surveyor's duty to submit to the town authorities : 

"It lieth upon both sides of the Merrimac River on 
the Nashua River. It is bounded on the south by Chelms- 
ford, by Groton line, by country land. The westerly line 
runs due north until you come to Souhegan River to a hill 
called Drain Cut Hill, to a great pine near to said river at 
ye north-west corner of Charlestown school-farm ; bounded 
by Souhegan River on the north ; and on the east side 
Merrimac it begins at a great stone which is supposed to 
be the north-east corner of Mr. Brenton's farm, and from 
thence it runs south-south-east six miles to a pine tree 
marked F. standing within sight of Beaver Brook." 

There is much more in the report of the good sur- 
veyor, who we can not doubt did his work well and 
reported the same carefully and faithfully ; but this little 
fragment will be quite enough to show you the quaint 
wording of the times. 

This tract of land includes what is now Dunstable, 
Tyngsboro', Dracut, Groton, Pepperell, Townsend in 
Massachusetts, besides what is now Nashua, Hollis, 
Hudson, and parts of six other towns all in New Hamp- 
shire. 



144 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The settlements of the present pretty little village 
sprang up along the shores of Salmon Brook. 

This little town had its share of trouble with the 
Indians ; and there are records upon records showing that 
the early settlers were brave and daring, standing In'avely 
by their homes as long as any hope of life remained. At 
one time they were driven into their garrison where for 
days they lay in terror of attack. At another time, unable 
to resist the force of the Indians in the uprising of Philip 
in 1675, the little band of settlers left their homes and 
sought protection in the neighboring towns. Even in this, 
one heroic man, braving all danger, stood firmly at his post 
during the whole war, and was afterward given the honor 
of being called the first real settler of Dunstable. The 
house in which this brave man, Jonathan Tyng, dwelt 
was situated on the Merrimac, just opposite the Wicasnick 
Island. The house was long known as the haunted house, 
and even now the old cellar, grown over with weeds and 
bushes, may be seen. 

Fortifying his house as best he could, he sent to 
Boston for help, and there stood through the long war with 
Philip, a lone outpost between the enemy and the settle- 
ments below. 

Again, in King William's War, an attack was 



STUKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 145 

planned upon Dunstable. This was, however, fortunately 
averted through information given ])y two friendly Indians 
who went to Major Henchman, then commander of the 
little garrison at Pa wtucket Falls, and disclosed the whole 
plot. Help was immediately sent to Dunstable, and forty 
men were despatched to scour the country for the enemy. 
Thus the attack was prevented ; but tlie Indians were not 
the kind to be turned from their purpose, and a few weeks 
later four Indian spies were seen lurking about the settle- 
ment of Dunstable. They were carefully watched, and 
soon all seemed quiet. But there is never any means of 
reckoning upon the movements in Indian warfare. Not 
many days passed, when one beautiful September evening 
there stole into the quiet little village, a band of Indians 
bent on vengeance. Creeping up to a little farm-house, 
somewhat apart from the village, they fell upon the 
inha])itants and murdered five of them. A few days later 
and another attack ; and two more of Dunstable's brave 
pioneers were murdered. 

No one town in our state, perhaps, stood in so exposed 
a position and suftered so much from dread of the foe. But 
the little village lived on through these trying times and 
came at last to be the beautiful, peaceful, prosperous little 
town it now is. 



146 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 147 



SUDBURY. 

Another town not far from Concord, is the small town 
of Sudbury. Of itself little can be said, other than that it 
is quiet, prosperous — a beautiful village in the summer-time. 

There is, in its centre, a large, open green, with the 
white church, always a part of the New England village 
landscape. 

There is the Wadsworth Monument, erected in 
memory of Captain Wadsworth, who, in King Phillip's 
War, fell bravely fighting to defend the tower. And 
there is the Walker Garrison, the only one remaining of 
the several garrison houses built in the early days of the 
town when garrison houses were so needed. 

Along the highway — towards South Sudbury — 
stands a group of oaks, certainly centuries old. Beneath 
these oaks, old town records say that Washington and his 
soldiers passed ; beneath them a military force, marching to 
Ticonderoga and Crown Point, in the French and Indian 
Wars, stopped to rest 

But more than for these historic landmarks, will 
Sudbury be always dear to the people's hearts for the 
associations clusterino^ about its old tavern. 



148 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

This tavern, called in "ye olden tyme"the Red Horse, 
was built as early as 1686 ; and for a full century and a half 
was kept by generation after generation of the Howe 
family. It stood on the turnpike '' twenty-three good 
English miles from the Boston Town House," and was a 
favorite inn for tired travelers, after a day's traveling out 
from Boston, over hard, rough roads. 

But it is not its history, though that is full of cheer, 
that has made the tavern ftimous. It is to the poet 
Longfellow that its glory is due. Although only twice did 
he ever stop in the little town, there was something about 
the tavern that sus^o^ested to him the idea of makino' it the 
site of the Wayside Inn, of which everybody has read, 
who has ever read anything of our beautiful })oet. 

In a journal of Longfellow's, we lind these words about 
the tavern and about the poems : 

1862. Oct. 11. — Wrote a little about the Wayside 
Inn — only a beginning. 

Oct. 31. — October ends with a delicious Indian- 
summer day. Drove with Fields to the old Bed Horse 
Tavern at Sudl^ury — alas, no longer an inn. 

Nov. 11. — The Sudbury Tales go on famously. I 
have now five complete, with a great part of the prelude. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 149 

Nov 18. — Finished the Prelude to the Wayside Inn, 

Nov. 29. — At work on Torquemado, a story for the 
Sudbury Tales. 

I need not tell you about these stories ; by-and-by 
you will read them for yourself. But the description of the 
tavern, as Longfellow gives it in his prelude, will not be out 
of place • 

" One Autumn night, in Sudbury town, 
Across the meadows bare and brown. 
The windows of the wayside inn 
Gleamed red with fire-light through the leaves 
Of woodbine, hanging from the eaves, 
Their crimson curtains rent and thin. 

^' As ancient is this hostelry 
As any in the land may be, 
Built in the old Colonial day. 
When men lived in a grander way. 
With ampler hospitality ; 
A kind of old Hobgoblin Hall, 
Now somewhat fallen to decay, 
With weather-stains upon the wall, 
* And stairways worn, and craz}^ doors. 



150 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

And creaking and uneven floors, 

And chimneys liuge, and tiled and tall. 

" A region of repose it seems, 
A place of slumber and of dreams, 
Remote among the wooded hills ! 
For there no noisy railway speeds, 
It torch-race scattering smoke and gieeds : 
But noon and night, the panting teams 
Stop under the great oaks, that throw 
Tangles of light and shade below, 
On roofs and doors and window-sills. 
Across the road the barns display 
Their lines of stalls, their mows of hay. 
Through the wide doors the breezes blow. 
The wattled cocks strut to and fro, 
And, half effaced by rain and shine, 
The Red Horse prances on the sign. 
Round this old-fashioned, quaint abode 
Deep silence reigned, save when a gust 
Went rushing down the country road, 
And skeletons of leaves, and dust, 
A moment quickened by its breath. 
Shuddered and danced their dance of death. 
And through the ancient oaks o'erhead 
Mysterious voices moaned and fled. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 151 

And farther on in the prelude he says : 

" But first the Landlord I will trace ; 

Grave in his aspect and attire ; 

A man of ancient pedigree, 

A Justice of the Peace was he, 

Known in all Sudbury as " The Squire." 

Proud was he of his name and race. 

Of old Sir WilUam and Sir Hugh, 

And. in the parlor, full in view, 

His coat-of-arms, well framed and glazed. 

Upon the wall in colors blazed ; 

He beareth gules upon his shield, 

A chevi'on argent in the field. 

With three wolf's heads, and for the crest 

A Wyveru part-per-pale addressed 

Upon a helmet barred ; below 

The scroll reads, " By the name of Howe." 

And over this, no longer bright, 

Though glimmering with a latent light. 

Was hung the sword his granclsire bore 

In the rebellious days of yore, 
■ Down there at Concord in the fight." 

Sudbury people themselves are very proud of their 
old .tavern, and do not, like too many of our " property 



152 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

improvers," long to pull it down and build in its place a 
more fashionable hotel. 

It will be preserved by the people as long as its old 
oaken frame shall stand ; and judging from the well- 
preserved appearance now, that wall be for many, many 
years yet. 

It has been proposed that the old sign of the Red 
Horse again be hung over the door, that the tavern may be 
marked to all travelers who pass through the village. 

Who knows but some day it may be again the scene of 
literary gatherings? And perhaps, then will be told within 
its walls, stories as wonderful and as beautiful as those 
which Longfellow has made the travelers tell who gathered 
there so long ago ! 



* * Human hearts remain unchanged : the sorrow and the sin, 
The loves and hopes and fears of old are to our own akin ; 
And if, in tales our fathers told, the songs our mothers sung. 
Tradition wears a snowy beard, romance is always young. 

— J. G. Whittiek. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



153 




WENHAM LAKE. 



" THE WITCH OF WENHAM." 

The ever-changing winds of the early springtime blew 
warmly upon the sunny slopes of Crane's River; and m 
every woody dell the violets opened their eyes, as the 
twitter of the birds wakened them from their winter's sleep. 

"Just the day to go a-wooing," thought Andrew, as 
he slipped on his Sunday coat. But before he could leave 
the house his mother called after him, "Where are you 
going, son Andrew? " " Only to Wenham Lake to catch a 
few perch," he replied. 

" No, no, my lad," said his mother," you are not going 
after fish, I am sure, but to see that blue-eyed witch, who 



154 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

lives beside the pond. Ah me ! there is no witch in 
Salem jail that is not a saint compared to her." 

" Hush, mother," the young man cried," how can you be 
so cruel ? That fair girl has as white a soul as any God 
ever made. She takes care of her mother, who is ill and 
blind, and reads to her daily from the good Book, and 
cheers her heart with comfortino^ sono^s." 

But Andrew's mother would not be convinced, for, in 
those days, the belief in witchcraft was the rule and not the 
exception. And when, in spite of her pleading he left her 
and rode toward the lake, she wept long and bitterly. 
Finally she bethought herself that probably the minister 
could break the witch's spell with holy words and prayers ; 
so she hastened to his house and told him all about it 
and l^egged him to save her son. 

"Do not be afraid," said the preacher, "we will save 
Andrew and punish the witch, for many a good Avife can 
testify to having heard the girl speak words which have 
changed the butterflies into yellow birds ; nor is that all ; 
for they also say that even the wild bees will fly to their 
hive at her bidding, and that when she calls the fish Avill 
swim to the shore and take their food from her hand. But 
be comforted, for even now Marshall Herrick rides to the 
lake to take her prisoner." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 155 

So Andrew's mother left the minister and went home, 
fully convinced by those silly stories that the girl must 
belong to the Evil One, and that she deserved to be severely 
dealt with. 

Marshall Herrick sat in his saddle ready to start on 
his cruel errand, fully believing that arresting witches was 
a most commendable and praiseworthy service and particu- 
larly pleasing to the Lord. 

Just fancy how grim he must have looked on his 
gaunt, gray horse, as he rode swiftly through Wenham 
town after poor Andrew's sweetheart. 

Of course he found her and carried her off too, with 
her hands tied fast together, though she begged him pit- 
eously to let her go, or at least to allow her to say good-by 
to her mother. 

" Let me free," she begged, " for your sweet daughter's 
sake." But he answered, "I'll keep my daughter safe from 
witchcraft and will take you to Salem as the law com- 
mands." 

So he carried her away from all she loved to a dreary 
farm-house, and there shut her up in the dim old garret and 
bolted the door behind him. 

Slowly the hours passed by and the shadows lengthened 
and even the twinkling stars, as they came out one by one? 



156 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

were not much company for the poor girl in her utter loneli- 
ness. But by-and-by the moon rose, and through the little 
window the moonbeams strayed in, making silvery paths of 
light on the dusty garret floor. 

And just at midnight Andrew's sweetheart fancied 
she heard her lover's voice whistling a well known tune. 
Filled with hope, she forced the oaken scuttle back, and, 
listening, heard him whisper, " Slide softly down the 
roof." 

You may be sure she did not wait to be told twice, 
but slid carefully along the sloping roof till she hung from 
the eaves. 

Then Andrew called, '^ Drop down to me, dear Jieart, 
and I will break your fall." Gladly she obeyed him, and 
almost before she knew it, he had placed her on his pillion, 
and they rode silently away. When they were once out 
of hearing, Andrew urged his horse to the top of his speed, 
and away they went over hill and dale, fording the streams 
as best they might, but never drawing rein. 

Next day, at noon, they reached the Merrimac River, 
and the old ferry man, as he put them across, stole many 
glances at the girl's fair face, and when the}^ reached the 
shore, he exclaimed as he watched them mount their horse, 
" God keep her from the evil eye and from the harm of 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 157 

witches ! " Then Andrew's sweetheart laughed merrily and 
whispered, " He does not know that I am a little witch ! " 

So they rode on and on, and at sunset reached the 
friendly town of Berwick, where the good Quakers made 
them so welcome, that they remained there in safety until 
better days came. And better days did come soon; for 
people began to realize that in the excess of their zeal and 
self-righteousness they had been persecuting the innocent, 
and they grew to be ashamed of their fear of witchcraft, 
and finally set free those who had been imprisoned. 

So, after the sadness of spring and summer, came a 
winter of content ; and when once more the early violets 
purpled the hill side, and the meadow-land along the inlets 
from the sea grew green with the spring-tide glory, intol- 
erance and superstition gradually died away, and innocent 
people no longer filled the jails. 

Would you not like to read this story in the poem from 
which it was taken? I am sure you would, and if you will 
do so, you will find that Whittier's tuneful words picture 
vividly the mistaken notions of those days ; and as you read 
his verses you must remember that witches were thought 
to work their charms and spells, not only beside the clear 
waters of Wenham Lake, but also in other towns and 
villages, not so very far away from where Andrew helped 
his sweetheart to escape. 



158 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




S 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 159 



SALEM. 

Salem is one of the oldest American settlements. It 
is a beautiful city, situated on a lovely bay, and was once a 
chief sea-port. When Boston Harbor was blockaded 
in the those early times of trouble with England, I 
don't know what would have become of the colonists if 
Salem had not generously allowed them the use of their 
harbor. 

Salem has many beautiful streets, with great spreading 
elms on either side, meeting overhead. And so many 
quaint old mansion houses ! Many of them can boast of 
timbers brought from England before the days of mills in 
the colonies. 

And there are so many legends and stories connected 
with this town. So many homes of early colonists of note ; 
so many sites of "first churches," and "first houses," and 
"first battles," that you see Salem must be rich indeed in 
stories of colonial times. 

Still, of them all, I suppose nothing would attract 
more quickly the interest of any historical lore gatherer 
than." Gallows Hill," where the witches used to be hano^ed. 



160 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Now, witchcraft did not originate in Salem, as 
many not widely-read people seem to think. Indeed, one 
would hardly know where to say it did originate. It seems, 
through all the centuries, to have burst out from time 
to time, in some form or other, like a smouldering 
volcano. 

For some time in Old j!ngland it had been raging, pre- 
vious to its breaking out in ilio colonies. (31dmen and old 
women were being hanged ind drowned, tortured and 
burned, hundreds upon hundreds of them. Every vessel 
that came over brought stories upon stories of wonderful 
witch-doings. Everybody talked about it ; everybody 
feared it ; everybody watched for signs of it. Is it any 
wonder then, that in time, everybody began to see signs of 
witches among their own people? Is it any wonder then, 
that a few sensitive, imaginative, sickly persons, and many 
terrified children began to really think themselves be- 
witched? Many an innocent child in those days suffered 
agonies of fear as he lay in his rough little attic room and 
listened to the moanins^s of the forests and thousfht of the 
witch stories that every where were being told. Many a 
child was thrown into terrible convulsions from simple 
fright, and then the blame of it laid upon some poor, inno- 
cent old woman in the town. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



161 






HOUSE or REBECCA NOURSE. 

Ill what is now Dan vers, aljout three miles from 
Witch Hill, or Gallows Hill, stands the old "Noarse 
House." The story of this house is as follows : 

Rebecca Nourse, one of Salem's kindest, most gentle 
old ladies, lived in the quiet old house with her sons, brave, 
good lads, who loved their mother with a tenderness and 



162 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

devotion that shows she must have been a rare, good 
woman, and a strong, wise mother. 

Every! )ody loved Rebecca Nourse. No one ever so 
ready to help in the church, no one so ready to defend the 
down-trodden, lift the fallen, speak words of cheer to the 
discouraged, no one so ready and willing, and skillful in 
the sick room as she. 

Aunt Rebecca Nourse was a village word. Everybody 
knew Aunt Rel)ecca ; everybody loved her. Everybody 
could remember some time when her kind word, her care, 
her goodwill had carried them over hard places, given 
them fresh courage and helped them on. 

Fancy then the horror, the fear, the surprise, when one 
day, through the village, went the startling news, ''Rebecca 
Nourse is a witch ! Rel)ecca Nourse is a witch ! " 

Sure enough, a circle of girls, who sometimes met 
together to sew and to gossip, hadl)een anuising themselves 
by trying all sorts of witch charms, telling witch stories, 
ghost stories, until they had frightened themselves into a 
genuine panic. " We are bewitched ! We are bewitched ! " 
they cried; "O, save us, save us, we are bewitched! 
See, see, it is Rebecca Nourse ! There ! There ! 
there she is ! Up the chimney ! In the air I Save us ! 
Save us !" 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 153 

And the excited girls, frightened out of their senses, 
would fall to the floor in convulsions. 

Eebecca was seized, thrown into prison, examined by 
the conclave of men who pretended to be able to judge, and 
was sentenced to be hano^ed. 

It was a cruel, cruel thing ; but the country was beside 
itself with fear. No one dared sleep in the dark for fear 
of ghosts ; no one dared ride through the forests for fear of 
witches. 

A ride through the woods at night was something 
indeed to be dreaded. The bushes were full of spectres. 
The rustling of the leaves were whispers of the witches. 
The tall white birches were ghosts ; and the very boughs, 
the outstretched arms. 

Many an otherwise brave rider spurred his poor steed 
along through the forest, driving him as did Tam O'Shanter 
in the Scotch story. 



* * Ye who listen to the tale of woe, 

Be not too swift in casting the first stone, 

Nor think New England bears the guilt alone. 

This sudden burst of wickedness and crime 

Was but the common madness of the time. 

When in all lands that lie within the sound 

Of Sabbath bells, a witch was burned or drowned. 

— H. W. Longfellow. 



164 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




ROGER WILLIAMS' HOUSE, {^aleill). 



The house in which Roger Williams once lived stands 

on the corner of North Street. Let us walk down this street 

till we come to North River and the old bridge which spans 

it. Now shut your eyes to the rows of crowded buildings, 

and imagine great trees on both sides of the street, and 

poor, oftensive, tan-be-fouled North River here, a wide, 

pure, beautiful stream, winding out from among wooded 

hills. 

If you can do this you will have some idea of the 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 165 

appearance of this part of the town when the bridge was 
built, away back in 1744. 

A monument now stands at one end of the bridge to 
mark, as it says " the place where the first armed resistance 
was made to British forces." By the time you have read 
the inscription you will want to know all about the fight. 




OLD NORTH BRIDGE, {Salem). 

Captain Mason had been ordered by a committee, sent 
by the Continental Congress, to give into the care of Mr. 
John Foster, who lived on the north side of the river, 
seventeen cannon, for the purpose of having them fitted 
with carriages. 

Some one went at once to Boston and told Governor 
Gage that cannon were being secreted in and about Salem. 



166 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

"That Av^ill never do," thought Gage, "we must stop that at 
once." So he sent off, with all speed, Colonel Leslie, with 
three hundred troops. 

Leslie and his men arrived by water off Marblehead, 
about noon of the next day, which happened to be Sunday ; 
but the quick-witted Marblehead people surmised what the 
soldiers were about and sent men to warn the Salem 
citizens. 

The Salem people were attending church. The meet- 
ings were dismissed, the bells were rung, the drums were 
beat, alarm guns were fired, and the people gathered 
together to plan what they should do. 

On the south side of Salem is South Kiver. The 
troops from Marblehead were obliged to cross this by the 
way of the South l)ridge. Salem people accordingly set to 
work and destroyed this bridge. 

While Leslie was repairing the bridge so that his 
troops might pass over, the Salem men hid the cannon, 
some in a gravel pit, and some in the woodlands near 
by. 

Some one told Leslie that the guns were at North 
Salem and away filed the troops down North Street. 

They reached the North Bridge, when lo ! the bridge is 
drawn up, and on the opposite side of the river is a long 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 167 

line of citizens, resistance tind determination written all 
over them. 

"You may as Avell give up the cannon at once!" 
bawled Leslie to a Salem citizen. 

^' Find them if you can! take them if you can! they loill 
never he surrendered " came the answer. 

Surprised and angry, Leslie drew up his men in line 
and prepared to open fire. "I warn you," said Captain 
John Felt, a Salem gentleman, to Leslie, "that if you fire 
not one of your men will leave Salem alive." 

Leslie then tried to cross his men in the fishing boats 
which lay in the river, Ijut the patriots saw what they were 
about and set the boats adrift in a twinklino^. 

It looked very much as though blood would be shed, 
but the Rev. Thomas Bernhard, of Salem, coaxed the 
citizens to allow the troops to cross the bridge and march 
a few rods beyond, provided they would then return 
peacably to Boston. The agreement was made, the troops 
marched the appointed distance, but no cannon could they 
find, and so were obliged to march back empty handed. 

Thus ended " the first armed resistance " to British rule 
in America ; and had it not been for wise and cool-headed 
Thomas Bernhard and John Felt, the first blood of the 
Revolution would have been spilled just here. 



168 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

****** 

When Salem's commerce was at its height, South river, 
broad and deep, crept far up into the town, even to the 
spot where the old stone depot stands, and was crowded 
with every kind and size of craft. 

In those days the little folks kept eager watch of the 
harbor, each one anxious to be the first to bear the tidings 
to the owner's ears of some returning vessel. Often, shad- 
ing their eyes from the sun, they could count as many as 
five India-men sailing into the harbor at once. 

Sailors just returned chatted on street corners with 
those just about to depart, or lounged at the sailors' board- 
ing house, w^here the children listened with awe to their 
wonderful stories of foreign lands and treasures. 

The shops were full of these treasures, from tea to 
screaming parrots, and monkeys that frisked about among 
the roofs at their own free will. 

There were the mathematical instrument maker's shops 
with their queer swinging signs in the shape of a quadrant : 
there, too, were the sail-lofts where, on the smooth floors, 
sat the sail makers, their curious thimbles fastened to the 
palms of their hands, busily stitching the great, white sheets 
of canvas that were to bear the ships away through storm and 
sunshine. Do you wonder that everything on land and sea 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 169 

and river seemed all the time inviting the lads to become 
sailors ? 

But once out upon the sea, so tempting and blue in the 
sunshine and making such grand music in the storm, the 
young adventurers did not find everything to their tastes. 

We can hardly begin to imagine their danger. They 
had no correct charts, and no instruments by which to find 
out their location upon the sea. Then there was always 
the danger of running upon rocks and shores in the dark- 
ness, for there were no friendly light-houses upon the 
shores. 

In such days as these, and amid such perils, the ship 
Margaret, with a crew from Salem, Ipswich and Beverly, 
set sail from Salem Harbor (1809). 

In spite of some small mishaps, they reached the 
Eastern shores safely, took on their cargo — tea and pepper 
probably — and cruising around to Naples, set sail from that 
city for Salem. 

For more than a month they sailed peacefully ; but one 
morning in May a squall struck the ship and she was 
thrown, as sailors say, "on her beam ends." It was impos- 
sible to right her. 

The next morning found the sea more calm, and one of 
the boats being mended, four men left the ship. Luckily 



170 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

they were picked up by a passing brig bound for Boston. 
The anxiety and suffering of those left upon the wreck 
were terrible. They raised a signal of distress ; one by one 
four ships passed them by, but oifered no help. 

Many of the crew died, and one morning at sunrise, 
unable to endure imprisonment longer on the dangerous 
w^reck, about seventy-fiye of them set sail in a small yawl 
which belonged to the ship. 

Terrible days followed, days of fierce hunger and 
fiercer thirst, of watching the horizon in hopes of relief 
which never came ; of seeing friends and brothers lose 
hope and die one by one. One day, in June, came a slight 
fall of rain. How eagerly the dying men held up their 
handkerchiefs in the hope of catching a few precious drops ! 

In a few days twenty-eight of the number were dead. 

Then came a morning with the sea running heavily, 
when they lost their oars, when their masts were broken 
away, and they gave themselves up for lost. 

Some looked gloomily into the water in silence, 
some wept, others, more hopeful, looked towards the 
horizon. 

^^Ho! a sail I a sail!'' 

Handkerchiefs, bits of sails, flutter wildly in the air. 
Loud cries come from the parched throats of the ship- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



171 



wrecked crew, nearer comes the ship and now, O joy ! it is 
bearing down upon them. 

The ship proved to be from Gloucester. The captain 
of the vessel rescued them, treated them with the greatest 
care and kindness, and took them safely home. 




OLl) FIRST CHUliClI, ~,S<l 



When you visit the Essex Institute building at Salem, 
ask to 1)e shown the first church ever built in America, 
(1629). 

An attendant takes a key from its peg ; and such a 



172 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

key ! big enough to unlock a giant's doors. If this is the 
key, what must the size of the church be, you think, as you 
follow her out into a well-kept grassy enclosure. And lo I 
there is a little old building with two windows on a side, 
with tiny, diamond-shaped window panes, and one narrow 
door at the end; this, you are told, is the veritable old 
churcli . 

The ponderous key turns in the lock, the door swings 
slowly open. The plaster is new, of course, l)ut the old 
frame, put together more than two hundred years ago, is 
carefully preserved. The inside is scarcely larger than a 
fair-sized kitchen. 

«Tust over the door is a little old gallery which must 
have been reached by ladders. Pictures of some of old 
Salem's citizens, a view of the outside of the old church it 
self, with a list of the names of its pastors, are on the walls. 

At the end opposite the door is a rude, wooden table, 
the communion table of those long gone years. A queer, 
folding child's seat is screwed to the beam which runs 
around the floor of the building. 

Some old desks which once belonged to Salem's mer- 
chants have l)een brought in and placed in the centre, and 
at one side is a little old desk used by Nathaniel Haw- 
thorne while he was in the Salem custom house. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 173 

Take a seat upon this old fashioned settle, a sort of 
settee with the back reaching half way up the wall, and 
rest a while. 

Time was when busy Essex street was a narrow lane 
where cows passed to and from pasture, and when rattling, 
bumping stage-coaches were the only means of traveling 
from place to place by land. 

In those days this queer little building was a wayside 
inn, away out on the road from Lynn to Salem ; the only 
road, too, by which the people of Marblehead could reach 
the interior towns. What tales the time-stained beams 
might tell of weary travelers who rested and smoked at the 
inn on chilly evenings ! 

Afterwards it was moved to the corner of Essex and 
Washino^ton Streets and made into a church. 

The minister's place was opposite the door. The seats 
were benches, probably logs at first. 

The women had seats all liy themselves at the left of 
the middle aisle, the men at the right. Fancy sitting in 
this tiny den which never echoed the sweet sound of an organ, 
upon such seats, through a sermon two or three hours 
long ! 

When, at last, the building had outlived its usefulness, 
it wjis moved to this quiet, shady spot and kept as a relic. 



174 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 175 



NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 

Forget the witch stories, forget everything of Salem if 
you will ; but don't forget the name of this man who was 
such a friend to you and to everybody. 

He was born in that quaint old house on Union Street, 
Salem — the one with the gambrel-roof and the enormous 
chimney. 

In speaking of his home and of his own room in this 
quaint old house, Hawtiiorne himself says : 

" Salem, October 4th., Union Street (Family Mansion). 
" Here I sit in my old accustomed chamber, where I 
used to sit in days gone by. Here I have written many 
tales — many that have been burned to ashes, many that 
doubtless deserved the same fate. This claims to be called 
the haunted chamber, for thousands upon thousands of 
visions have appeared to me in it ; and some few of them 
have become visible to the world. If ever I should have a 
biographer, he ought to make great mention of this cham- 
ber in my memoirs, because so much of my lonely youth 
was wasted here, and here my mind and character were 
formed ; and here I have been glad and hopeful, and here I 
have been despondent. And here I sat, a long, long time, 



176 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

waiting patiently for the world to know me, and sometimes 
wondering why it did not know me sooner, or whether it 
would know me at all — at least, till I were in my 
grave." 

Hawthorne wrote many ])ooks — l)eautifal, refined 
books; for he himself was what a certain okl English 
writer would have called, a " parfic gentil knight." 

For you, children, he Avrote a Wonder Book, a book of 
"Grandfather's Tales," as he called them, and many other 
short stories, — two of which," The Snow Image" and " The 
Great Stone Face," I have seen children sit listening to, 
breathless, forgetful of all else, fascinated by the wonder- 
ful beauty and sweetness of the author's language. 

If you have not read them, there is a rich treat in store 
for you. You will learn to love this gentle-souled writer, 
and will be glad enough, were you to visit Salem, to go 
down Union street and find the quaint old house where 
Hawthorne lived. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 177 



MEDFORD. 

Some of those emigrants who came to Salem at th^ 
time of the settlement of the Massachusetts Colony, 
wandered up and down the coast, seeking other places for 
settlement besides that chosen by the company at Salem. 

Reaching Medford, the broad, rich marshes and 
meadows attracted the attention of these wanderers ; and 
they began a settlement there upon the Mystic, calling it 
Medford, or, as some records claim, Meadowford. 

This was in 1630 ; and in 1634 we find recorded in the 
State records the following, which gives an accurate idea 
where this original Medford was located : 

" There are two hundred acres of land granted to Mr. 
Nowell, lying on the west side of North River, called Three 
Mile Brook (Maiden River) . There are two hundred acres 
of land granted to Mr. John Wilson, pastor of the church in 
Boston, lying next to .: e land granted to Mr. Nowell, on 
the south, and next to Medford on the north." 

In 1687 there came a time when, the population increas- 
ing, it became necessary to have well defined boundaries for 
this town of Medford. Accordingly three men were 
appointed to attend to the matter. Surveying and record- 



178 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

ing were not then done with the care and formality observed 
in these days — that is, if we may judge from the reports 
these worthy men submitted to the authorities. For they 
say, "We have settled and marked both stakes and lots as 
follows : From the creek in the salt-marsh by a ditch below 
Wilson's farm and Medford farm to a stake and heap of 
stones cut of the swamp, then turning to the savin tree and 
to three stakes more to heaps of stones within George Blan- 
chard's field, with two stakes more and heaps of stones 
standing all on the upland, and so round from stake to stake 
as the swamp runneth * * * ^^y ^i^^^ corner 

line on the south side of the country road leading to 
Maklen," 

Certainly there were stakes enough ; but the stakes 
were not true and weather-proof; therefore, later in the 
history of the town, we find no little trouble arising from 
disputes about the exact boundaries. 

But we care little al)out that at this late day ; so we will 
turn to points of greater interest. 

The Mystic River, for example, is a river particularly 
Medford's own. It rises, flows through, and has its outlet 
almost all within the limits of the town. 

There are two reasons given for the name Mystic. 
One reason is, and very likely Medford boys, who have 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 179 

tried to row up and down the river, appreciate this, that 
the current has a way, all its own, of running now in one 
direction, now in another, having no respect, apparently, 
for the law of rivers that says the current shall run from the 
source towards the mouth. This current was a irreat 
m^^stery to these early settlers ; hence the name, so some 
writers say. Others say that the Indian name for the river 
was Missi-tuk, "great tide river," and that the name is but 
an Anglicized form of that word. 

But the name mattered little in these colonial days ; its 
usefulness mattered a great deal . And from the very begin- 
ning it was the great waterway between Boston and Med- 
ford. Long, open l)oats were built upon it, and in those 
places where the tide failed, strong ropes were fastened to 
the boats, by which they were pulled along l)y men from 
the banks. 

Not ver}^ much of historical interest is connected with 
this river ; though in the records of 1775 we read that " This 
day there was skirmishing on the Mystic. Several soldiers 
were wounded. The house at Penny Ferry, Maiden side, 
was burned," And again, "Several gondolas sailed up 
the Mystic River, upon which the Medford people had 
skirmishes ; many shots were exchanged." 

Pne of Medford's very first names of note is Governor 



180 



STORIES. OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 181 

Craddock, from whom the bridge is named, and whose 
house still stands, well preserved, and claiming to be the 
oldest house in America. 

Matthew Craddock was a close friend of Governor 
Winthrop's, and it was through the governor's desire to 
have his friend near b}^ that he settled here in Medford. 

Even as early as in 1634 Craddock began to build his 
home. It was a great house in its time — a real mansion. 
Its walls so thick and strong, its shutters and its port-holes, 
seem to indicate that the house Avas intended, should occa- 
sion require, to serve not only as a dwelling house, but as 
a fort and a garrison. And certainly it is well located for 
a house of defence — on high land and near the river. Its 
walls are eighteen inches thick, and there are heavy iron 
bars across the two large arched windows. Several fire- 
proof closets are built into the walls ; the old door was iron- 
barred, and there was one pane of glass set in the back 
wall of the west chimney evidently for the purpose of com- 
manding a view of persons approaching from the town. 
There are other very old houses in Medford, still standing, 
and in a fair state of preservation ; and it is to Medford's 
credit that these old relics of an early time are held in 
respect, and that a reasonable attempt is made to preserve 
them. 



182 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Medford has its share in Indian history. The 
great Namepashamet for a brief time dwelt upon Rock Hill, 
not far from which he died and was buried. 

The great Sagamore John, too, lived in Medford, and 
was always friendly to the settlers. At one time, so the 
records say, he apprised them of a premeditated attack of 
hostile Indians, near by. In an early Massachusetts l)ook, 
it is said of this Sagamore John," He desired always to learn 
and speak our language, and he loved to imitate our man- 
ners and our apparel. When he died he said, 'Now I must 
die ; the God of the English is much angry with me and 
will destroy me. Ah, I was afraid of the scoffs of the 
wicked Indians : yet my child shall live with these English, 
and shall learn to know their God when I am dead. I will 
give him to Mr. Wilson. He is much c^ood man and much 
love me.'" 

Every precaution was taken by Medford's early settlers 
to keep peace Avith their copper-colored neighbors, and for 
a long time there was no trouble. Governor Craddock was 
wise and fair in his dealings with them, and the people 
were willing to follow his directions. Nevertheless, the 
houses were carefully fortified and palisaded, for there was 
in the Indians, even the best of them, a vein of treachery, 
that allowed the white man never to rest quite at ease. On 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 183 

the other hand, the very precaution which the white men 
took to defend their homes, aroused the suspicion of the 
Indians and kept them on the alert. 

Descendants of these Indians were to he found in 
Medford even as late as the beginning of tliis century. 
They lived in "Turkey Swamp," and even now it is 
common to find about their arrow-heads, their stone-drills, 
and other weapons and tools. 

The very last Indian living was Old Hannah, who 
lived in West Medford, opposite where the old town school 
house used to stand. "Old Hannah was kind-hearted, a 
faithful friend, a sharp enemy, a judge of herbs, a weaver 
of baskets ;" so says Mr. Brooks, the Medford historian. 
After the Revolution, and you may be sure the 
Medford men and women were not lagging in interest or in 
bravery in those days, Medford town grew, as all these 
towns around Boston have grown, ^\\i\\ more people, more 
houses, more business. As we said before, many of the 
old historic buildings have been preserved ; the old Crad- 
dock Bridge has been replaced by a strong granite arch ; 
there are public buildings and a fine library ; broad, shady 
streets, and fine old residences. It is, as it always has 
been, a "town of good repute;" and if there is nothing 
very especial to say of it in these later days, it is merely 



184 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. # 

because such is the quiet and peacefulness of the times that 
no opportunity comes for its people to do heroic, brave 
deeds ; as in its earlier days they were always so ready to 
do. 



Look now abroad — another race has filled 

These populous borders, — wide the wood recedes, 

And towns shoot up, and fertile realms are tilled ; 

The land is full of harvests and green meads ; 

Streams numberless, that many a fountain feeds. 

Shine, disembowered, and give to sun and breeze 

Their virgin waters ; the full region leads 

New colonies forth, that toward the western seas 

Spread, like a rapid flame among the autumnal trees. 



— Bryant. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 185 



NATICK. 

This town received its name from an Indian word 
meaning " the town of hills." An old description of this 
town in an ancient looking book, which you can find (only 
you will not care to) in the Boston Public Library, says : 

"Natick, the place of hills, is watered by the Charles 
River and contains numerous fish-ponds. There are two 
villages a mile apart — North Natick, the new, consisting 
of thirty dwellings, and South Natick, the ancient, consist- 
ing of twenty dwellings." 

This would hardly be a satisfying description of the 
Natick of to-day, I fear. Most especially would the 
bustling, busy North Natick resent it. But Natick, the 
place of hills, was a beautiful town in those days, even 
if it was not busy and bustling. 

South Natick claims our attention most for its his- 
torical interest. 

It Avas here the first Indian meeting house was built, 
the Indians being brought together and instructed by John 
Eliot, the Indian missionary. 

This good man was called the Apostle of the Indians. 
He worked and preached among the Indians for many 



186 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



long years. He lejirned their languages, lived among 
them, sat about their camp tires, slept in their tents, 
taught them to read, to till the ground, to s})in. He 




founded schools and churches. He even wrote out in their 
own crude lan<2:ua<>e, the Bible; and this he read to them 
and taught them to read. 

This Bible was, by-and-])y, when printing-presses 
came, the first book printed in the American colonies. 

He lived a long, happy, useful lifco 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 187 

Here on the Charles, where South Natick now stands, 
an Indian town was laid out, which consisted of thi;ee long 
streets— two on the Boston side of the river, one on the 
other. The houses w^ere built in Indian fashion ; and there 
was one large house to he used for school and church. 
There was a large fort, too, circular in form, and palisaded 
with trees. 

This little community had a strange form of govern- 
ment. They formed it as nearly as they could u]:>on the 
jTovernment which, in the Old Testament, we are told that 
Jethro proposed to Moses — " a hundred met together, 
chose one ruler of a hundred, two rulers of fifties, and ten 
rulers of tens." 

It was a hard time the good Apostle had with his wild 
converts, and a puzzling time he had trying to translate the 
Bible into their queer language. Here is a line of the 
Lord's Prayer : 

Our Father in heaven ; hallowed 

Nushun Kesu Kqut Quttianatamunach 

thy name come thy kingdom 

Ktowesuonk : Peyaumuutch Kukketassutam oouk 

But there ! I am sure you will not care to read another 
word. Think of trying to learn to read and spell the 



188 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

words of that language ! It makes us think reading in our 
own language easy after all. And certainly it is, compared 
with the Indian lano^uagre. 

But what an endless amount of patience, and what a 
world of love for these poor Indians Eliot must have had 
to be willing to learn their whole language that he might 
make for them an Indian Bible ! 

There is a funny little story told illustrating the 
troul)le he often had to find a word in the Indian lanijuao^e 
to express the meaning. At one time he wished to 
translate from the Book of Judges : " The mother of 
Sisero looked out at the window and cried throuo^h the 
lattice." He went to the natives one after another for the 
word. He tried to show them by signs what he meant. 
At last they gave him what seemed the right word, and he 
wrote it down. Imagine his surprise some years later, 
when he had learned their dialect better, to find that the 
word they had given him meant eelpot. 

There his translation stood saying, in Indian language, 
" The mother of Sisero looked out at the window and cried 
through the eelpot." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



189 




190 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




CUTTING l>OWN MORTON'S MAY-POLE. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 19 J 



OLD MERRY MOUNT, 

Out on Wollaston Heights is a place called Merry 
Mount. I wonder how many Massachusetts children 
know its history. 

Among so many sad stories as we find in the early 
history of our colonies, I know of no merrier one than the 
story of Merry Mount. 

This region was settled by Captain Wollaston, and he 
brought Avith him, in spite of his own soberness, a "jolly 
crew," as the sailors express it. There was one Thomas 
Morton, who, good hearted soldier though he was and a 
great favorite among his fellow-soldiers, still was perhaps 
not quite as honorable as we would like to think him. He 
fretted under the rigid manners of the people and under 
the stern government of the captain. 

Some way we cannot but have some s^mipathy with 
him, when we recall that the people were so severe in 
their ideas of what they called right and wrong that a 
hearty laugh was looked upon with as great a horror l^y 
some as an oath would have been. 

It is little wonder then that one day when the Cap- 
tain was away, Morton said, "Come, come, my good lads I 



192 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The captain's away, now for sport ! Let's dance and sing ! 
sing and dance ! " 

Morton's spirit of rebellion was " catching." One l)y 
one the soldiers joined him, and such a merry-making as 
followed ! Never had the sober old ibrests resounded to 
such shouts and cheers. 

" A M.ay-pole ! A May-pole ! " cried Morton. " Let's 
have a^ May-pole ! Let's have a good old English May- 
pole dance ! Let's drink and carouse, and dance and sing !" 

The Indians joined them ; and night after night the 
white men sat about the camp-fires, or danced a])out the 
May-pole, with the Indian warriors and the Indian squaws 
hand in hand. 

"The May-pole," says an old description of this time, 
"was a goodly pine-tree eighty feet high, with a fine pair 
of horns nailed upon the top of it." 

It is a pity that Morton and his band could not have 
been content to merely have a "grand good time." Some 
way we coukl not but have sympathized with them that 
they burst out from the over rigid customs of the day and 
seized upon the joy that belonged to them. 

But to be true, we must admit that, after a time, they 
grew reckless and wild. It is a hard thing, you know, 
when you are having great fun, to know just when to 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



193 



stop. So with these merry-makers. They went so far 
that Captain Miles Standish with his troops marched from 
Plymouth to arrest them. 

Now Miles Standish was not one to dally in any work 
he undertook. And before the merry-makers had any 
suspicion of what was at hand, this energetic, prompt 
captain was upon ihem, Morton was in chains, the Indians, 
terror stricken, Avere driven away, and the revels at Merry 
Mount came to a sudden end. 




194 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



QUINCY. 

Qaincy is a town of contrasts, for, while one part of it 
is given np to every day life, another section of it is very 
sedate and dignified., with houses l)uilt a long time ago, 
when people never thought of such a thing as re-building 
every few years, as they do now-a-days. 




BIRTHPLACE OF JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. 

Among them is the old Quincy House, with its solid 
tim])ers of oak, still bearing upon them the marks of the 
axe ; and on the walls of one of the rooms may yet l)e 
seen the (juaint Chinese paper, which, tradition says, was 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 195 

bung there when everything was made new and fresh, in 
honor of pretty Deborah Quincy's marriage in 1775. 

And then, there is the Adams House, with its Ions:, 
sloping roof. Such a nice roof to slide down in the winter 
time, one would think, if only the snow drifts were high 
enough under the eaves. 

You are all interested in this house, for here John 
Adams lived, and here his famous son, John Quincy, was 
born, and rocked in the queer old cradle you see in the 
picture. 




CRADLE IN WHICH ADAMS t>LEPT. 

While he was still quite young, the family moved into 
a more pretentious mansion, called the Yassae House. 
John Adams was very fond of this new home, but as he 
grew to be an old man, he tired of almost everything, and 
used to say, that he wished he could go to sleep in the 



196 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

autumn like a dormouse, and not wake up until spring. 
No wonder he felt that way, after all his busy, active life 
devoted to serving his country. 

He did the work of two or three ordmary men, and, 
in spite of it, lived to be over ninety. He died on the 
4th of July,- 1826, the fiftieth anniversary of Independence, 
just when all his townspeople were celebrating the day with 
games and sports, and the ringing of bells and booming 
of guns. Very pleasant were these sounds of rejoicing to 
the staunch old patriot, whose famous toast, "Independence 
Forever," will live forever in the loyal hearts that own 
allegiance to the Stars and Stripes.* 

When John Adams died, his son had already reached 
the height of his political fame, and, as President of the 
United States, had practically made his home in Washington. 

Even during his childhood, he did not spend much 
time in Quincy, for he went abroad with his father, who 
was sent to France and England to negotiate peace and 
alliance with those countries. 

Soon after his arrival in France, John wrote home to 

his mother as follows : 

Passy, September the 27th, 1778. 
Honored Mamma : 

My Papa enjoins it upon me to keep a Journal, or a Diary 
of the Events that happen to me, and of objects that I see, and 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 197 

of Characters that I converse with from day to day ; and altho' 
I am Convinced of utility, importance and necessity of this 
Exercise, yet I have not patience and perseverance enough to do 
it so constantly as I ought. * * A Journal Book and a 

letter Book of a Lad of Eleven years old Can not be expected to 
Contain much of Science, Literature, Arts, wisdom or wit, yet it 
may serve to perpetuate many observations, that I may make, 
and may hereafter help me to recollect both persons and things, 
that would otherways escape my memory. * * * * 

Was not this a wise conclusion for a lad of eleven to 
come to? And he did not forget it either, for in 1779 
the diary was commenced, and in after years he rarely 
failed to chronicle even the happenings of his every day 
life. 

If you will look at the picture, you will see just how 
a page or two of John Quincy Adams' first attempts at 
keeping a journal looked. 

I think he did pretty well for a small boy, don't you? 

This diary, taken as a whole, is one of the longest 
works of the kind to be found in any library ; and it is 
very valuable, because, in later years, Mr. Adams made 
mention in its pages of every man of note in the United 
States. 

He had the best opportunities for knowing them intim- 
ately ; for they were nearly all engaged in that political life 



198 



STORIES or MASSACHUSETTS, 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 199 

in which he proved him8elf so great a statesman, that even 
those who did not agree with his views, could not fail to 
admire his courage, wisdom and integrity. 

How many men who hold pul)lic offices now-a-days, 
can lay claim to the proud distinction of being unswerv- 
ingly faithful to what they believe to be the best interests 
of the country? 

As Minister to Prussia, and later to Russia, as Com- 
missioner to treat for peace with Great Britain, as Senator, 
Secretary of State and President of the United States, one 
leading characteristic marks the official life of Mr. Adams, — 
he was absolutely incorriiptihle. 

But the town of Quincy lives in the present as well 
as in the past. It calls our attention not only to what has 
been, but also to what is. 

From noted names and famous old houses with their 
conscious air of belonging to other days, Ave may turn 
to the lovely, modern homes which line the shady streets, 
and to that well-known section of the town, where 
large derricks stand as sentinels, guarding the granite 
works. 

Surely, you have heard of Quincy granite. Perhaps 
you know, too, that one of the quarries is called the Bun- 
ker Hill Quarry, because it was bought and worked for the 



200 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

purpose of obtaining this exceptionally fine granite for the 
Bunker Hill Monument. 

Many noted buildings have been built of stone brought 
from Quincy ; among them King's Chapel in Boston, and 
the famous Hancock mansion, which stood on Beacon Hill. 
In order to move the large blocks of granite a railroad 
was constructed, called the Granite Railway. Although it 
was only four miles long, it cost $50,000 dollars. The rails 
were of wood and placed upon stone tires, and horses were 
used to draw the cars, for almost forty years ; then the Old 
Colony Railroad Company l)uilt a modern railroad, which 
was opened for traffic in the fall of 1871. 

This new means of transit proved to be of great ben- 
efit to Quincy ; which is now one of the pleasantest suburbs 
of Boston, and since the changes which have been made in 
favor of temperance, it may fairly be said that never did 
the town contain Avithin its limits so many prosperous, well- 
to-do, contented, self-governed and well-governed human 
beings as are contained within them to-day. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 201 



DOWN ON THE CAPE. 

Do you ever think that it is " down on the Cape " that 
Massachusett's history began? Why, to be sure, Plymouth 
is on the Cape ; and that otlier old town, Province- 
town. I have known certain newly-made American 
citizens to make what we call spread-eagle speeches about 
Plymouth Rock, " our national corner-stone ; " and then, 
in the next breath, toss out some careless, indifferent, 
even slurring remark of Cape Cod. 

Very likely he forgot his geography ; perhaps he 
was a Bostonian and thought that if Plymouth was any- 
where, it was somewhere out in Boston Harbor. 

Boston is a great city, of course, we all agree. We 
may well be proud of it ; for it is historic as well as com- 
mercial and populous ; but let us not forget that our State 
is greater than our Capital ; and that Cape Cod is a large 
and important part of that State. 

First of all, "the Cape" was settled at Plymouth, in 
1620, by the Pilgrims. But as we read of Plymouth in the 
historical part of our book, we w^ill say no more of that 
town here : but pass on to other Cape towns of which we 
do not so often hear. 



202 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Fifty years ago people traveled to the Cape in a 
sailing packet. It made its trip once a week only ; and 
although to us who are angry at the railroad corporation if 
there is not, at least, an hourly train to everywhere, this 
may seem rather slow living and slower traveling, still I 
fancy the very lack of speed and conveniences of those 
days had its compensation. 

The soil of the Cape, is not inviting; but, after all, 
perhaps it is only a little less inviting than most of our 
New England soil ; for New England has never, and never 
will, shine in the world's great market as an agricultural 
country. But then, line soil is not by any means a 
sure indication of fine people ; rather it is the rugged soils 
that have produced races rugged and strong both in mind 
and body. And Cape Cod is no exception. The Cape 
Cod people are and have always been among the most 
rugged of our " rugged New England people." 

Speaking of the soil, Samuel Adams Drake in his 
" Nooks and Corners " says of Cape Cod : " The region 
between Sandwich when you enter the Cape and Orleans 
when you reach the bend of the fore-arm is Ixid enough ; 
but beyond this is simply a wilderness of sand. The 
surface about Brewster and Orleans is rolling prairie, 
barren, yet thinly covered with an appearance of soil. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 203 

Stone walls divide the fields, but from here down the Cape 
you will seldom see a stone of any size in going thirty 
miles. My faith in Pilgrim's testimony began to diminish 
as I looked on all sides, and in vain, for a ' spit's-depth of 
excellent black earth,' such as they tell of. It has, 
perchance, been blown away, or buried out of sight in the 
shiftings constantly going on here." 

Speaking of the shape of the Cape, he says : "To 
me it looks like a skinny, attenuated arm thrust within a 
stocking for mending — the bony elbow at Chatham, the 
wrist at Truro, and the half-closed fingers at Provincetown. 
It seems quite down at the heel about Orleans, and as if 
much darning would be needed to make it as good as new." 

Nowhere in New England have the old Pilgrim 
customs been so nearly preserved as here on ''the Cape." 
It is on " the Cape " that you find so many of the old-tash- 
ioned double houses; the fire places, the old ovens, the 
" spare -chambers," with their " live-geese " feather beds 
heaped upon the massive mahogany bedsteads ; and the 
cold, stiff, unused '' best rooms " opened and warmed only 
on festal days. It is on "the Cape" that communicies are 
still contented, industrious, thrifty, temperate ; and all of 
tliese are Pilgrim customs. 

"The Cape" houses are filled with relics. It is the 



204 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

place for old china and old furniture collectors ; for down 
there are real " Washington plates " and furniture that 
would make an antiquarian's heart bleed ; and the good 
"Cape" people love and reverence these for their real 
worth, and will not sell them for dollars and cents. 

Every old house has its treasures, too, from foreign 
lands ; there are " cedar chests " in every garret, with India 
shawls, and oriental fans, and silk l)rocades. For every 
family has had its sea captain, and its sailor lads. And 
many a house mourns the loss of these l)rave men ; and the 
treasures they brought — this on their tirst voyage, that, 
alas, on their last voyage — are carefully laid away and 
watched over as sacred things. 

Next to the towns of Plymouth and Provincetown, 
Truro, Sandwich, and Yarmouth, are perhaps as well 
known to us as any. 

Truro was named from the city of Truro in Cornwall, 
England ; and from the prominent family names of both 
Truros — Payne, Dyer, Rich, Higgins — there is no doubt 
as to the relationship of the towns and their i)eople. 

Truro's first meeting-house is no longer standing " on 
the hill of storms ; " ])ut for a hundred and twenty 
years it stood on the " wind swept plain," the great 
land mark of Cap Cod, which the incoming sailors, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 205 

straining their eyes to see, welcomed as the first sight of 
home. 

The general history of these quiet little Cape towns 
is, after all, so alike in general color — varying only in 
their local tints — that perhaps in a little book like this, 
where we can do little more than glance at even 
the largest cities, it is quite as well to let them pass 
together in the general picture we have had of them in the 
few pages W'C have just read. 

Sandwich and Yarmouth, so recently celebrating their 
two hundred fiftieth anniversary, have brought themselves 
into notice more than they ever dreamed of doing. That 
was a great day for the little towns, and a proud day too. 
For sons and daughters and grand-sons and grand- 
daughters, Avho had long ago gone out into the world to 
seek fame or fortune, or both, came back again to the little 
town, to prove how noble a little band of good and great 
people these towns had sent out into the world. 

And the little town welcomed them, one and all. 
There were processions and brass bands ; there were flags 
and banners weaving from historic houses ; and there were 
speeches and clambakes — these always go together on 
"the Cape ; " and in the evening, a boating carnival on the 
beautiful lake, Chinese lanterns, fire-works, everything 



206 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 207 

that could make the day one grand gala both for residents 
and visitors. 

The settling of a new town was always a hard, severe 
experience to its founders : but little Sandwich had more 
than its share of misfortune ; for its settlement was, so the 
old people say, preceded by the worst " line storm " New 
England ever knew, and was followed by an earthquake 
which did no little damage to all the country around. 
Wolves, the New England pest, conceived a special fond- 
ness, so the discouraged farmers sometimes thought, for 
the Sandwich farms. 

In both Sandwich and Yarmouth the only roads were 
Indian trails, some of which are pointed out to this 
day. The road to Plymouth ran along the shore, and 
until the grist-mill was l)uilt at Sandwich, these farmers 
walked to Plymouth with their corn upon their shoulders, 
or, following the old Indian fashion, pounded the corn to 
meal in stone mortars. 

Both towns had their share in Quaker persecution, l)ut 
at no time was the persecution in the Plymouth colony as 
cruel as in the Bay Colony. 

And they had their share in Indian troubles. No 
town in King Philip's war suffered more than did these 
two brave little settlements. 



208 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




SANDY NECK LIGHT-HOUSE. 



Love of home is a .strong characteristic of Cai)e 
Cod people. One writer, in speaking of them, says : 

"To the Cape Codder, like the Icelander and the 
Swiss, his native province is the best that the sun shines 
on. A Cape man finds nowhere else so glorious a home, 
so full of such sweet memories. The Cape colors him all 
his life — the roots and fibre of him. He may get beyond, 
but he never gets over the Cape. Make him a merchant 
at Manilla or Calcutta, a whaler in the North Pole, a mate 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 209 

in Australian waters, a millionaire on Fifth Avenue, a 
farmer in Minnesota, and the Cape sticks to him still. 
He will recall in odd hours, to his life's end, the Creek tide 
on which he floated inshore as a boy ; the hunger of the 
salt marsh in haying time ; the cold splash of the sea-spray 
at the harbor's mouth, the spring of the boat over the bar 
when he came home from fishing ; the blast of the wet 
northeaster in the September morning, Avhen, under the 
dripping branches, he picked up the windfall of golden 
apples. And he will see, in dreams perhaps, the trailing- 
arbutus among it^ gray mosses on the thin edge of a spring 
snow-bank, the bubbling spring at the hill-foot near tide 
water, the fat, crimson roses under his mother's windows, 
with a clump of Aaron's rod or lilac for background ; the 
yellow dawn of an October morning across his misty moors, 
and the fog of the chill pond among the pine trees; and, 
above all, the blue sea within its headlands, on which go 
the white-winged ships to that great far-ofl:* world which 
the boy had heard of and the grown man knows so 
well." 



210 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



THE FIRST THANKSGIVING DAY. 

" Aud now," said the governor, gazing abroad on the piled-up 

store 
Of the sheaves that dotted the clearings and covered the meadows 

o'er, 
" 'Tis meet that we render praises because of this yield of grain ; 
'Tis meet that the Lord of the harvest be thanked for his sun and 

rain. 

" And, therefore, I, William Bradford (by the grace of God to- 
day, 

And the franchise of this good people), governor of Plymouth, 
say,— 

Through virtue of vested power, — ye shall gather with one 
accord 

And hold, in the month of November, Thanksgiving unto the 
Lord. 

"He hath granted us peace and plenty, and the quiet we've 

sought so long ; 
He hath thwarted the wily savage, and kept him from wrack and 

wrong : 
And unto our feast the sachem shall be bidden, that he may know 
We worship his own Great Spirit, who maketh the harvests grow. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 211 

"So shoulder your matchlocks, masters; there is hunting of all 

(degrees ; 
And fishermen, take your tackle and scour for spoil the seas ; 
And maidens and dames of Plymouth, your delicate crafts employ 
To honor our first Thanksgiving, and make it a feast of joy ! 

" We fail of the fruits and dainties, we fail of the old home cheer ; 
Ah ! these are the lightest losses, mayhap, that befall us here. 
But see ! in our open clearings how golden the melons lie ! 
Enrich them with sweets and spices, and give us the pumpkin- 
pie ! " 

So, bravely the preparations went on for the autumn feast : 

The deer and the bear were slaughtered; wild game from the 

greatest to least 
Was heaped in the colony cabins ; brown home-brew served for 

wine ; 
And the plum and the grape of the forest for orange and peach 

and pine. 

At length came the day appointed ; the snow had begun to fall, 
But the clang of the meeting-house belfrey rang merrily over all, 
And summoned the folk of Plymouth, who hastened with glad 

accord 
To listen to Elder Brewster as he fervently thanked the Lord. 



212 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



In his seat sat Governor Bradford ; men, matrons, and maidens 
fair. 

Miles Standisli and all his soldiers, with corslet and sword were 
there : 

And sobbing and tears and gladness had each in its turn the sway, 

For the grave of sweet Rose Standish o'ershadowed Thanksgiving- 
day. 



And when Massasoit, the sachem, sat down with his hundred 

braves, 
And ate the varied riches of gardens and woods and waves, 
And looked on the granaried harvest, with a blow on his brawny 

chest, 
He muttered : " The Good Spirit loves his white children best ! ** 

— Makgaret J. Preston. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 213 



PROVINCETOWN. 

On the 11th of November, 1620, the Mayflower came 
to anchor in the beautiful harbor of Provincetown, and 
here the Pilo-rims refreshed themselves after their lonof sea- 
voyage, and took in wood and water, and fitted out a little 
skiff in which to coast alono^ the shore. 

Just think how they must have enjoyed the fragrance 
of the oaks, the pines, the junipers and the sassafras, and 
other sweet woods which lined the shores of the bay, and 
sheltered its waters from the force of the storm. 

While the Mayflower swung to and fro at its anchor- 
age the first little Pilgrim, Peregrine White, was born. He 
took very kindly to New England clouds and sunshine, 
growing steadily up to manhood, proud of the distinction 
of being the first real Yankee boy on the Cape. 

All these happenings and many more should make the 
sunny harbor and near-by town very attractive to us, if 
some pleasant day we should take a trip to the very end 
of Cape Cod, where ProA'incetown has the world all to 
itself. Snugly nestled among the sand-hills lies this little 
town ; small compared to the manufacturing cities, but 
large in its importance as a valuable fishing station from 



214 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 215 

whence many and many a vessel sails away for its annual 
cruise to the Grand Banks. 

At first the boats employed carried only six or eight 
men, Init of late years larger vessels have been built, and 
many of the schooners are manned by crews of twenty-five. 

The season for these trips extends from April to 
September, and thousands of dollars worth of cod-fish are 
brought back every year, for Cape Cod turkey, as the 
Cape people call it, is one of the staple food supplies of 
the world. 

But cod-fish are not the only fish the men of Province- 
town sail away after in their boats. No, indeed ; there 
are mackerel and blue-fish to be caught in the oreat 
Atlantic Pond ; and then the shell-fish, — dear me ! we must 
not forget them — clams, scallops, shrimps and lol)sters, 
and that very important member of shell-fish society, the 
oyster. 

All along the shores of this part of the Cape known 
as Barnstable county, lie the oyster beds ; acres upon acres 
of them, forming more than two-thirds of all the grounds 
in the State. But, unfortunately, the shifting sand is 
destroying them, and some day not far distant these beds 
will be a thing of the past. 

Notwithstanding the fact that Provincetown has large 



216 STpRIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

interests in sea-faring industries, tlie towns-people make 
even the sandy soil about home prove a good investment. 
Amonii- the sand hills lie the boi^s and the lowlands ; and 
when the l)ushes and stumps have been removed and the 
surface covered with a layer of sand, cranberry vines are 
set out, and before long the ripening berries gladden the 
hearts of the owners, and give the boys and girls, as well 
as older people, a chance to show what nimble lingers can 
do. 

Although the cranberries require constant care, the 
business is a profitable one ; for when the fruit is sorted, 
and the barrels and boxes filled, it is a very easy matter to 
ship them to Boston and elsewhere by the Old Colony 
Railroad, which connects the smaller towns with their 
larger brothers inland. 

So every year the number of acres devoted to cran- 
berry culture increases ; and who knows but that in the 
future we shall have unlimited cranberry sauce from the 
Cape Cod cranberry fields. 

I shall not tell you much about the life-saving stations 
at Provincetown, for you will read about the Surf-Side 
Station at Nantucket, and the story of one is in many ways 
the story of all ; a pleasant story enough, too, in the 
sunny days of mid-summer, when men may take their 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



217 




218 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



ease amid the bay berries and beach grasses ; l)ut a sad one 
in the winter time ; for then come days and nights of 
storm and disaster, when every risk must be talven, and 
every nerve strained, in order to rescue lives and property 
from the sea-beaten wrecks. 

But most of the stories of Provincetown itself are 
not those of the dangers of the near-l)y ocean, but of the 
enterprise and success which have made the place one of 
the leading towns on the Cape; and more than all this, if 
you ever visit the farm-houses or village-houses, and stroll 
about among the wharves or along the beaches, and row 
along the shore, you will carry away with you, I am sure, 
only pleasant memories of Provincetow^n and the sheltered 
harbor where the Mayflower cmce floated safely at anchor. 







■^5. 



•**:3:yX» 







STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 219 



STORIES OF NANTUCKET. 

" God bless the sea-beat island ! 
And grant forever more, 
That charity and freedom dwell 
As now upon her shore." 

Nantucket, anchored thirty miles out at sea, makes a 
capital pleasure ground for the good people of Massachu- 
setts, who should have a special interest in it since it 
belongs to the Commonw^ealth. 

A pleasure ground of fifty square miles is worth having, 
don't you think so ? The Indians wdio were its first owners 
evidently appreciated it, and even had a legend as to the 
way in which it was discovered. 

The story goes that a great many moons ago an im- 
mense bird visited the shore of Cape Cod and carried away 
a large number of small children. This so enraged the good 
giant Mashope, Avho dwelt there, that he waded into the sea 
in pursuit of the bird, and, crossing the sound, reached 
Nantucket. 

Here he found the bones of the children heaped up 
under a large tree ; but whether he captured the bird or not 
the legend fails to tell. 



220 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 221 

However, it seems that before he left the island he sat 
down for a comfortable smoke, and smoked so much and so 
long that he caused the fogs which have since prevailed there. 
In allusion to this tradition, when the Indians saw a foe: 
rising, they would say, "There comes old Mashope's 
smoke." 

A rather more reliable account of the discovery of Nan- 
tucket is that which gives the credit to Bartholomew Gos- 
nold, a noted English navigator, who is thought to have 
visited the island in 1602. 

After that year white men must have frequently landed 
there, although the Indians remained in almost undisturbed 
possession until 1G59, when one Thomas Macy, with his 
family and two or three friends, came from Salisbury in a 
small sail-boat, bringing with them such of their posses- 
sions as they could conveniently carry. 

Afterwards Macy and othei-s purchased the island from 
Thomas May hew, to whom it had been deeded by the Eng- 
lish proprietors. 

Erom the first the Indians regarded the white men 
with favor, and in return the settlers honestly bought and 
paid for the land they occupied, and successfully set- 
tled what disagreements arose, in a fair and peaceable 
manlier. So the town of Nantucket experienced none of 



222 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 223 

those horrors of Indian warfare from which so many 
other settlements in Xew Eng-land suffered. 

As the years passed, other families came from the 
mainland, and the general prosperity increased. Very 
many of the Indians died ; the remainder gradually became 
Christianized ; and many adopted the customs and even the 
occupations of the white men. 

But both races were soon to be taught a new industry ; 
for in 1690 Ichabod Paddock, from Cape Cod, came to Xan- 
tucket and showed the islanders how to kill the whales that 
frequented the harbor. Their success was immediate, and 
soon small sloops and schooners were built for the chase ; 
these were finally fitted out with try- works, so that when 
whales were captured and the blubber cut up, the men could 
try out the oil on ship-board and not have to wait until they 
returned to the shore. 

Now came the palmy days of Nantucket. With all the 
sea for a work-shop, and all the world for a market, no 
wonder the whaling interest grew to be of large proportions. 
Fleets of vessels lay at the wharves, loading or unloading 
©r refitting for new voyages. Harpoons, lances and cutting 
spades, coils of rigging and lines for the boats were 
familiar objects. Coopers, blacksmiths, riggers and rope- 
makers had no idle moments from Monday morning till 



224 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Saturday night. And if they were busy men, what do 
you think the candle-makers were, for before the Revohition 
three hundred and eighty tons of spermaceti candles 
were manufactured nt Nantucket every year? 

But the Revolutionary War interfered sadly with the 
whalemen. Everything necessary for the outfit of their ves- 
sels must be brought to the island ; but if they traded with 
the colonies, the British seized their ships, and if they pro- 
cured their supplies from foreign ports, the Colonial Govern- 
ment pronounced them smugglers, and dealt with them 
accordingly. 

How glad they must have been when the seven years 
of war were ended ! As soon as possible, after peace was 
declared, the good ship Bedford, with a cargo of four hundred 
and eighty-seven butts of oil, sailed for London, and had 
the honor of ])eing the first vessel to hoist the American 
flag in any British port. 

At the close of the Revolution business revived, but 
did not reach its former activity until after the war of 1812. 
Then once more the warehouses were crowded with goods 
and the streets thronged with heavy drays and busy, pros- 
perous people ; and vessels sailed away to come back not 
only laden with oil, but bringing silks and teas, and fruits 
and wines, and curiosities of every sort from the many for- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 225 

eign ports they touched at. Frequently the captains would 
take their wives with them when going long voyages, 
which sometimes lasted two or three years, and many a 
Nantucket boy and girl has been born on some of the 
sunny coral islands of the Pacific. 

But after 1842 the whaling interest gradually declined. 
Disastrous fires visited Nantucket. The great fire of 1846 
caused a loss of a million dollars, and crippled the people 
greatly. Then came the discovery of petroleum and a 
consequent decrease in the value of whale oil ; whales 
were scarcer and the expense of fitting out vessels grew 
greater. 

So before many years the whale ships became scattered ; 
some were used in the coal trade between South American 
ports, and some, alas, once so often laden with valuable, if 
greasy cargoes, were left to lie idly rotting on the California 
coast. 

Although the Nantucket of to-day seems a very sleepy 
place compared to the bustling sea-port it once was, it does 
not lack in interest. 

There are the light-houses, which I think most of you 
would enjoy visiting, and the old wind-mill, which was 
built in 1746, probably for Eliakim Swain, though there isti 
story that the women got tired of grinding samp and meal 



226 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

in the clumsy stone mortars, {ind iinally concluded to ask 
Elislia Macy, a handy sort of man, to build them a wind- 
mil]. 

Macy thought it all over, but could not quite decide 
how it should be done ; but when he went to bed that 
night he dreamt just how to build it ; and upon going to 
work the next dtiy ho followed the phm with very good 
success. 



As very likely that is not a true story, I think I 
must tell you one that is : 

In the tower of the Unitarian Church hangs an old 
Spanish l)ell, purchased in Lisl)on in 1812 hy Captain 
Clasl)y and brought to Nantucket that same year. It had 
belonged to a chime of six bells, and still bears an inscrip- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 227 

tion, showing that the devout people of Lisbon had intended 
to hang it in one of their churches as an offering, ^' To the 
ofood Jesus of the mountain." 

For three years after it was safely landed, it lay stored 
in a cellar ; then it was purchased from the owner by sub- 
scription and placed in the town. Now, this Lisbon bell had 
a tone so low 'and musical that its fame was noised abroad, 
which finally reaching Boston, the good people of that 
city desired to procure the bell for the Old South Church. 
So they sent their agents, who offered to buy it, saying that 
they had a very line clock in their tower, but unfortunately 
their bell was broken, and they would like to have the old 
Spanish bell to take its place. But the representatives of 
the Unitarian Church replied that they had a very fine bell 
in their tower, and would like to know at what price the 
Old South Society would sell their clock. 

Surely, after that the agents must have returned home 
rather crest-fallen at the result of their mission. 

There are so many stories of Nantucket that we shall 
hardly know where to stop. I should like to tell you 
about the good times every one had at the yearly sheep- 
shearing, when the sheep were gathered together and 
washed and then shorn of their wool. This was no small 
task, for at one time from seven to ten thousand sheep 



228 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



roamed over the commons. When the work was done the 
good time began, and old and young made merry and 
enjoyed themselves so heartily that this yearly event 
became as popular as our great national holiday. Like 
many other old customs the shearings did not long survive 
modern ways. 

Yet after all there is much on the island "that time doe.? 
not seem to change ; and if you will visit the place some 
summer you may still see the old mill and the Lisbon bell, 
and may ramble through the once busy streets, now grass 
grown, and fish from the deserted Avharves ; and if you keep 
your eyes and ears open, I am sure you will come away 
knowing a great deal more about Nantucket than what I 
have told you. 




;ankotv light, (Xa7)tucJ:et). 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



229 




AMONG THE LIFE-SAVERS. 

When the bleak winter weather comes, and the wind 
whistles down the chimney, and the snow heaps itself on 
the window ledge as if waiting for a chance to fly in, do you 
ever think of the sailors who can not make port to escape 
the storm, but must stay on deck and handle the icy ropes, 
and keep the vessel on her course through all the bitter 
cold of days and nights at sea ? If you think of the many 



230 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

danoers they encounter, you will not l)e surprised to know 
that every year many ships are lost in mid-ocean, or wrecked 
on the coast, and that frequently all on ])oard are drowned. 

To prevent as many of these disasters as possible our 
Government has established more than one hundred and 
seventy stations along the Atlantic coast, besides many in 
the Lakes, where skillful men, who were once sailors them- 
selves, keep a sharp lookout, especially in stormy weather, 
for any vessels that seem to be in distress. Our own Com- 
monwealth has twenty of these stations, and one of the most 
interesting of them is on the island of Nantucket, thirty 
miles from the mainland. 

The town of Nantucket lies along the western and 
southern shores of what is called the inner harbor, to dis- 
tinguish it from the great outer harbor, where very many 
vessels may lie anchored at one time, though they would 
find entrance difficult on account of the sand-bar, which 
disputes the way with all comers, and upon which many 
gallant ships have come to grief. 

Indeed, the island itself is a very large sand heap, 
nearly fifteen miles long and of varying breadth, and for 
the most part quite level and destitute of trees ; for even 
the most hardy kinds cannot long thrive in the sandy soil, 
nor do the rough winds give them much chance to grow. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 231 

Out on the South Shore, at Surf Side, nearly two miles 
and a half from the town, is the Life-saving Station, and 
here, even in the summer time, the Avaves roll in with great 
force, and, as they break, till the air with flying spray. 
From the first of September until the end of April, the 
little house is well filled, as from six to eight men form the 
crew ; and though their hardest work is during the severe 
storms which drive vessels dangerously near the shoals in 
which that part of the coast abounds, still on sunny days 
they are by no means idle. The life-boats and their car- 
riages, the wreck-gun or mortar by which lines are shot to 
a disabled vessel, and all the beach apparatus, must be kept 
in readiness for instant use. Then, too, the captain of the 
crew frequently calls them out for a practice drill, so that 
every man may know exactly where his place is, and what 
will be expected of him. 

From the top of the station a sharp lookout is kept 
during the day time, but at sunset two of the crew start out 
and, going in opposite directions, each patrols the beach for 
three miles, always looking seaward and listening for signals 
of distress. Each patrolman carries relief signals, and if 
he discovers a vessel standing in toward the dangerous 
shoals, he lights one of them to warn the ship oft', or if she 
has already struck, to let those on board know that assis- 



232 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

tance is at hand. As soon as a wreck is discovered, the 
life boat is launched from the station, or, if that cannot be 
done, the lighter surf-boat is hauled to a point opposite 
the wreck, and the attempt to reach her is made. It some- 
times happens that the boats cannot be used, and when this 
is the case a life-line is shot across by means of the wreck- 
gun. When the strong rope attached to the line is made 
fast to the vessel's mast, a life-car or buoy can be run from 
the shore to the ship. 

Sometimes there are women and children on board. 
They are carefully placed in the car and so securely 
fastened that they can come through the high waves and surf 
safely ; and, of course, they are the first ones sent on shore, 
for until they are landed no really brave man would leave 
the ship. 

Perhaps you will wonder if there are so very many 
wrecks after all. Yes, notwithstanding all the precautions 
that are taken, the maps of the ocean, called charts, which 
all ships carry, and the light-houses and light-ships, to 
warn and guide the sailor, there have been over five hun- 
dred wrecks on the coast of Nantucket alone ; and in the 
summer time, as one wanders along the beaches, he may see 
spars and other wreckage half hidden in the sand. All 
that IS left, perhaps, of what were once noble ships. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 233 



GLOUCESTER. 

You all know where Cape Ann is, do you not? If so, 
I need not tell you where to look for Gloucester, for it 
covers nearly all the Cape, and finds a new name for itself 
in every separate corner it occupies. But whether we 
stop in Bay View or Annisquam, or Magnolia, or East or 
West Gloucester, we shall still be in this same famous 
fisherman's city. 

For two hundred and fifty years the fisheries have 
been the principal business of Gloucester. Before the 
settlement at Plymouth had been commenced, the vessels 
of France and Eno^land were fishino^ all alons^ the coast of 
Massachusetts and in Cape Ann's beautiful harbor. 

In 1626 the first settlement was made near it, and in 
1639 the little village received the name of a "fishing 
plantation," and kept it until three years later, when it was 
made a town. 

This harbor I have mentioned, is one of the finest in 
the north-east coast, and a large fleet might safely anchor 
within it. In the still dusk of a summer's evening, when 
half a thousand vessels, more or less, lie sheltered from 
the .winds and wave?, their many colored lights flash like 



234 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

fire-flies through the darkness, and, urged by the restless 
tides, they tug gently at their moorings as if eager to 
spread their wings and be off' again. 

And out from the harbor at the right time of year, 
thousands of vessels sail away, to come ])ack laden with cod 
and mackerel and halibut. 

Those engaged in cod-fishing carry strong lines, five 
hundred to one thousand feet long, and upon these, at 
intervals of from five to seven feet, are attached the hooks, 
from one to five hundred on each line, one end of which is 
fastened in the boat, the other anchored at the bottom of 
the sea, and its position marked by a floating buoy. 

In in-shore fishing, large nets set quite near each 
other are used. Most of the fishermen, however, go to 
the Grand Banks. 

The grounds for mackerel fishing cover 70,000 square 
miles, and as the fish move in schools from one part of the 
ocean to the other, the catch varies greatly from year 
to year. 

Fishing being the principal industry, you will not be 
surprised to learn that ship-building has been carried on at 
Gloucester since 1643. Here the first ship was launched, 
and this is the way it came to be called a schooner: 

"Mr. Andrew Robinson having constructed a vessel, 



STORIES OF MASSACHTJSETTS. 235 

which he masted and rigged in the same manner as 
schooners are at this day, on her going off the stocks and 
passing into the water, a bystander cried out, 'Oh, how 
she scoonsf Eobinson instantly replied, 'A scooner let 
her be.' From which time vessels thus masted and rigged 
have gone by the name of 'schooners.'" 

In the old days Gloucester vessels were sent to trade 
with other countries, taking fish, beef, pork, hams and 
flour, and in return bringing cargoes of molasses, sugar, 
coffee and cocoa. 

These trips were made in the winter time, when the 
men could not go fishing. Sometimes, too, they coasted 
to Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina and traded for 
corn, and beans, and bacon. But all these ventures were 
given up long ago. 

Gloucester does not pay much attention to manufoc- 
turing industries; indeed, the towns-folk are quite too 
busy collecting tribute from the sea. But there is one 
very important business carried on there, — that of 
boxing and putting up thousands of dollars worth of 
" boneless codfish " for fish dinners and the ever popular 
fish-ball. 

One firm alone employs three hundred men all the 
year round to prepare and send oft' this dried fish, while the 



236 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

odds and ends are made into a fertilizer, which is sold to 
the farmers throughout the State. 

But the people's time is not all given up to fishing 
and kindred pursuits. No, indeed ! Gloucester is a 
progressive little city, with fine churches and schools, and 
a free public library, the generous gift of Mr. Samuel E. 
Sawyer. 

I wonder if any more intelligent use can be made of 
money than that of enriching a town with a library for the 
people. All honor to the men who thus show both their 
liberality and their wisdom. 

From what I have told you, you will see that 
Gloucester has much to make it of great interest to 
visitors, both old and young; and many do go there every 
summer for the rest and change, and all the novelty they 
find in living for a little while among the fishermen of 
Cape Ann. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 237 



MARBLEHEAD. 

Let us sail into the little harbor at Marblehead. It 
doesn't seem right to approach Marblehead in any other 
way. Marblehead isn't Marblehead unless you come first 
upon it at the bottom of the hill where the wharves are. 

You see the long point of land extending out from 
Marblehead, on your left as you sail up the bay. 

That is Marblehead Neck ; a beautiful seaside resort. 
The houses are, you see, "beach-cottages." By-and-by, 
they will all be closed for the summer and the " Neck " will 
present an air of desertion. 

But the errand old weather-beaten rocks will still be 
there, the bright beacon at the point will still shine, the old 
churn will still roar. As w^e sail along, look backward 
and off to sea, toward those rocky shored islands, about 
which the surf sparkles in its white light. 

Such names as these islands have ! I wish they could 
speak to us, tell us their history and how they came to be 
given such meaning names. They sound as if, they might 
have been regular old pirate names ; Satan, Koaring Bull, 
Great Misery, Little Misery, Cut-throat Ledge. Did you 
ever hear such names ? 



238 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



W 




^^ 







VIEW IN MARBLEHEAU. 



Before the Revolution, Marl:)lehead was the principal 
fishing port of Massachusetts. But when the war came, 
none more ready, none more brave and willing, none more 
eager to join the poor little American army, and do their 
part towards defending their homes, as these same ])rave 
fishermen of Marblehead. It was a hard season for the 
Marblehead women ; 1)ut Marblehead women in these early 
days were a sturdy class. Nowhere in the colonies could 
you find stronger, braver women than they. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 239 

Again, in the war of 1812, tlie Marblehead fishermen 
were called away from their peaceful little shore ; and 
when the war was over, five hundred of these brave men 
lay dying in British prisons. 

Just how and by whom Marblehead was settled, is not 
known. It seems rather strange, that in this little colony, 
where there were so few people, that every one might 
easily know every other one, and where every little 
" clearing " was of especial care and interest to all its 
brother " clearings," that this settlement should be so 
shrouded in mystery. But as it was simply a fishing station 
at first, perhaps the little fishing-huts grew so gradually 
into homes, and the homes grew so gradually into a 
villao:e, that no notice was taken of it as a new settle- 
ment. 

But it is time our boat had reached the wharf, I am 
sure, and we may as well be getting ready to land. 

"But where shall we land?" do you say. Right here, 
at Tucker's wharf. See, there is a flight of green, shin}^ 
salty steps dipping down into the water in a most inviting 
manner. We will bring our boat up close. Now hurry up 
the steps — be careful ! do not slip. Those steps have done 
brave service for many a long year ; it is no wonder they 
are covered with sea moss. 



240 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Now we are at the top. Rather a disorderly place, is 
it? Well, you see there are so many fish barrels, and old 
boats, and new boats being painted, so many lobster cages, 
coils of rope, and heaven only knows what else dear to the 
fisherman's heart, and essential to the fisherman's trade, 
that the wharf has to be what a housekeeper would call 
"cluttered." 

But we will wind around among them, back of that 
building ; now we are on a Marblehead street. Such a 
funny street ! No regularity ! the houses in no lines, facing 
in all directions, projecting into the streets, staring at each 
other, turning their backs on each other ! Surely each 
house-builder followed his "own sweet will," when this 
town was laid out. 

Let us read this pretty description that Samuel 
Adams Drake has written of his journeyings in and about 
this quaint old town : 

"It was only after a third visit that I began to have 
some notions of the maze of rocky lanes, alleys, and 
courts. Caprice seemed to have governed the location 
of a majority of the houses by the water-side, and the 
streets to have adjusted themselves to the wooden anarchy ; 
or else the idea forced itself upon you that the houses 
must have been stranded here by the flood, remaining 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 241 

where the subsiding waters left them ; for they stand any- 
where and nowhere, in a ravine or atop a cliff, crowding 
upon and elbowing each other until no man, it would seem, 
might know his own. 

" An air of snug and substantial comfort hung about 
many of the older houses, and some localities betokened 
there was an upper as well as a nether stratum of society 
in Marblehead. Fine old trees flourished in secluded 
neighborhoods where the brass-door knockers shone with 
unwonted lustre. I think my fingers itched to grasp them, 
so suggestive were they of feudal times when stranger 
knight summoned castle-warden by striking with his sword 
hilt on the oaken door. Fancy goes in unbidden at their 
portals, and roves among their cramped corridors and best 
rooms, peering into closets where choice china is kept, or 
rummaging among the curious lumber of the garrets, the 
accumulations of many generations. On the whole, the 
dwellings represent so far as they may a singular equality 
of condition. It is only by turning into some court or 
by-way that you come unexpectedly upon a mansion having 
about it some relics of a former splendor. 

"There are few sidewalks in the older quarter. 
The streets are too narrow to afford such a luxury, 
averaging, I should say, not more than a rod in 



242 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

width ill the older ones, with barely room for a single 
vehicle." 

One of the first points of interest to you in Marble- 
head, will be the Lee Mansion. This was built in these 
early colonial times by Colonel Lee, who was one of the 
most earnest patriots in the days of the Revolution. 

There is little now about the mansion to attract the 
attention of a passer-T)y ; but once enter its broad front 
door, and you will know at once that you are in a house 
that has a history. 

First of all you find a broad hall — a very broad hall, 
and on its walls such remarkable paper ! There are great 
panel-shaped pictures upon it of Greek life, battle scenes, 
Roman cities, and one of them is a lively picture of a sea- 

fio'ht. 

This paper, once so beautiful, has now rather a dingy, 
dirty appearance ; but, considering that this hall was not 
long since used as a fish-market, it is little wonder that it is 
greasy and dirty. Doesn't it seem rather a pity to let such 
a erand, old house as this fall into the hands of those who 
care nothing for its historical associations ? 

But notice the rich wood of the staircase and the carv- 
ing of its balusters. Notice how many patterns there are 
in the carvin«:. All this was brought from England in 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 243 

ships, and was, it is believed, carved especially for the Lee 
Mansion. 

Now let us enter the room just here at the right. O 
dear, dear! The old Lees would groan, I think, if they 
were to enter it now. Once that grand old fire-place 
crackled and glowed with the fragrant fire of pine boughs. 
Once over it was painted a great picture of Esther before 
Ahasuerus — the wonder and admiration of all the simple 
folk of the village. But we can notice the rich wainscot- 
ing which reaches from floor to ceiling, and the w^onderful 
carvings. How they must have lighted up in those quiet, 
old days when the fire crackled and glowed so kindly ! 

There used to be upon the walls large painted portraits 
of Colonel and Madam Lee ; but these are now in posses- 
sion of certain of the Lee descendants in Boston. 

Colonel Lee, if he looked as he did in his picture, and 
there is no doubt he did, was certainlv a fine lookino^ man. 
He had an honest, open face, a clear, intelligent eye, and has 
an air of true dignity as he sits there, richly dressed in his 
brown velvet coat laced with gold, and the white Avig, 
which was, you know, the fashion of the times. 

Madam Lee, too, was noble looking. Her full, black 
eyes, her self-possessed manners, seem to prove that in her 
time she was indeed mistress of her position. 



244 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 





FORT SEWALL (Marblehead) . 



But we must not linger here. Out into the hull again. 
Don't forget that wonderful paper. I don't know where 
you could ever see anything like it again. I wonder if the 
Lee children knew what the pictures meant. If they did, 
they knew more of Greek and Koman history than children 
now-a-days know, I fear. 

Just glance up the staircase once more as we pass out. 
See that broad landing — large enough for a room. What 
a house this would be to give a colonial party in ! How I 
should like to see the guests wandering up and down this 
grand old staircase, the women in their rich brocades, 
their powdered hair, the men in their velvet coats and knee- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 245 

breeches, their sparkling buckles and their long-tailed 
wigs ! 

But let us Avalk along the waterside of the town. A 
dusty road? Yes, but a paved, well-ordered street would 
be so out of place in this quaint old town. 

Here is the old fort — Fort Sewall. Many a story of 
the brave Revolutionary days could this old fort tell us, 
could its gray, weather-beaten walls only speak. In those 
massive stones that make the o^reat wall overhanjjino^ the 
dark water, it is said that for many years there were 
imbedded British bullets. But time and the storms have 
worn away the rock and cement, and these bullets have 
long ago fallen into the sea. 

Upon the hill, overlooking the town, is the old burial- 
ground. There was a church upon this hill once — Marble- 
head's first church; and it was built here, high above the 
village, that it might serve as a look-out and a watch tower. 
Nothing of the old church remains now ; and, thank heaven, 
nothing of the terrors and dangers of those days w^hen 
watch-towers were needed remain. 

St. Michael's is the next place for us to visit. This is 
but a common little wooden church, to be sure, but it has 
a story to tell. It was not always as simple and plain as 
it looks now. The original roof had seven gables, a tower 



246 



STOEIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 247 

and several spires ; but this present roof was built over the 
old, and so that ancient glory is quite lost. 

But there is much inside the church of interest still. 
From the ceiling there is a chandelier of most curious 
pattern, which was a gift from an English merchant. In 
the organ loft is a quaint, wheezy little organ ; and behind 
the little pulpit is the Decalogue, lettered in the strange 
old English type of those times. 

It is said that under this church there Avere buried, at 
one time, those of the colonists who died, that the Indians, 
who were on the watch to fall upon the settlement, might 
not know that their number had been weakened by the 
loss of so many of its protectors. 

Have you read the story of old Floyd Ireson, who was 
tarred and feathered and borne in a cart Ijy the women of 
Marblehead? You will find it among Whittier's poems; 
and although Marl^lehead people do insist that there isn't 
"one word of truth in it,'' I'm sure I don't see why, 
if Floyd Ireson was as l)ad as the poem represents 
him, Marl)lehead women shouldn't have tarred and 
feathered him and dragged him in a cart through the 
streets of Marblehead. But then, you know, Whittier 
may have made free with the "poet's license," both as 
it regards Floyd Ireson's crime and his punishment. 



248 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

To be sure, that manner of punishing may not be quite the 
fashion to-day, but none of tlie colonial fashions are the 
fashion to-day. 

And in speaking of this poem of Whittier's I am 
reminded of another — that sad little poem of Lucy Larcom's 
— "Hannah Binding Shoes." In those few verses you get, 
perhaps, as full an understanding of the sad lives of many 
a Marblehead Avonian and the dangers which beset the 
brave Marblehead fisherman, as pages upon pages of 
authentic history could give you. 



Twenty winters 
Bleach and tear the ragged shore she views ; 

Twenty seasons ; 
Never one has brought her any news. 
Still her dim eyes silently 
Chase the white sails o'er the sea. 
Hopeless, faithful, 
Hannah's at the window, binding shoes. 

— Lucy Larcom. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 249 



NEWBURYPORT. 

Newburyport is one of Massachusett's prettiest sea- 
ports. Its main street, seven miles long, is a beautiful 
wide avenue, with great, over-arching elms, and grand old 
mansion houses, the homes long ago of the early sea- 
captains and wealthy sea-merchants. 

One of the land-marks of Newburyport, and the one, 
perhaps, to which a stranger would first be directed, is the 
old residence of Lord Timothy Dexter. 

Now Lord Timothy, as he called himself, and as he 
came to be called by all who knew him, was, to say the 
least, a peculiar person. He was one of those whom 
half the world will call a fool, the other half, a genius. 

He was enormously wealthy. He seemed, indeed, to 
have the Midas touch, for every business transaction, 
however absurd, seemed always to turn to his favor. 

For example, at one time a vessel was being fitted out 
for the West Lidies. As was the custom of those early 
times, every Newburyport man was anxious to make some 
little investment for himself, anxious to send something 
which should bring back to him from these rich, far-away 
islands, its value doubled and trebled. 



250 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

"What shall I send?" asked Lord Tmiothy, strutting 
up and down the wharves, as was his special delight. 

" Better send a cargo of warming pans," growled out 
a sailor near by — one of those who looked upon the 
unbalanced, self-conceited, strutting Lord Timothy as a 
creature fit only for an asylum. 

" Warming pans ! warming pans ! " cried the easily- 
imposed-upon Lord Dexter. " Warming pans it shall be ! " 
and away he flew to get his cargo together. 

Now, to send w^arming pans to a country as hot as the 
West Indies, was as ridiculous as it would be to export ice 
to the land of the Esquimaux ; and as the simple-souled 
Lord Dexter hastened away to collect his cargo, you may 
be sure the sailors and the merchants lau2:hed amonof 
themselves and looked upon it as a huge joke. Soon all 
Newburyport knew that Dexter's last " freak " was to send 
warming pans to the West Indies. 

But nothing is so true as the old saying that " he 
laughs best who laughs last." The weeks rolled on ; hy- 
and-by the vessel returned with its West Indian freight, to 
be distributed among those who had invested their shares 
in the cargo it had carried away. The wharves Averc filled 
with the expectant merchants — none among them more 
expectant than our good Lord Dexter. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 251 

'' My warming pans ! my West Indian investment ! " 
had been the continual brag of Dexter in all these weeks, 
until his words had become phrase words for the whole 
town. 

" Now for our warming pans ! " laughed the people 
among themselves, as the vessel drew nearer and nearer 
the wharf. 

But Lord Dexter never saw himself an object of 
ridicule ; or if he did, he never looked upon it as anything 
more than one added expression of the foolishness of the 
whole world. Lord Dexter was, indeed, like the old 
Quaker who said, "All the world's queer, wife, but thee 
and me ; and thee's a little queer." 

But the vessel had reached the wharf ; it was unloaded ; 
the caro^o was divided accordin^: to the success or failure 
of the various investments of the Newburyport merchants. 
And behold, Lord Timothy Dexter's was the greatest 
among them all ! Lord Timothy Dexter's share of profits 
outstripped and pushed out of sight the shares of New- 
buryport's greatest merchants ! Lord Timothy Dexter's 
warming pans had carried the market ! 

" What does it mean ? what can it mean ? " asked the 
sailors and the merchants, looking into each other's puzzled 
faces. "Warming pans in West Indies ! Has the climate 



252 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

there changed? Have the people gone crazy, like Lord 
Timothy himself? " 

" 1 knew it ! I knew it ! " cried the excited Dexter, 
waving his great three-cornered hat, and racing like a wild 
man up and down the wharf. 

" Well, you see," explained one of the incoming sailors, 
" it does seem as if everything that Dexter, fool though he 
is, sets out ^o do is bound to be a success. Now, those 
warming pans — who would have supposed there could be 
any use for those in a climate so hot, so scorching hot? 
But the natives seized upon those warming pans as if they 
were the thing of all things the country needed. ^They 
are sugar pans ! they are sugar pans ! ' cried the women. 
'With them we strain the sugar! See, see, how we strain 
the sugar ! ' " 

And sure enough, the pans, used in the north in those 
early days to hold hot coals with which to heat the cold 
rooms and the cold beds of the great unheated mansion 
houses, did make, in this sugar-boiling community in the 
West Indies, the very best of pans through which to strain 
their sugar. 

And so Lord Dexter's fortune was made ; and his 
joke-loving friends were forced to admit that the joke had 
indeed recoiled on themselves. The story spread from 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



253 




254 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

town to town ; and Lord Dexter's warming pans became 
a household word throiio-h all the country. 

Lord Dexter's Hie was full of strange experiences like 
this ; and many are the stories the old Newburyport resi- 
dents will tell you of this strange man. His great house 
on High Street was in its time a marvelous sight. Very 
large and broad, the grounds were generously adorned with 
great pillars, on the tops of which Avere all sorts of figures 
of leading men of the times — himself, you may be sure, 
among the rest. 

Another deed of this Lord Dexter, and the one, which, 
next to the Avarming pan adventure, has perhaps immortal- 
ized him most of all, Avas the Avriting of an odd little book, 
which he called 

"A Pickle for the Knoaaing Ones." 

And a pickle indeed, it Avas ; surely no one but very 
knoAvini2f ones could even have understood it. 

The spelling, like everything else al)out Lord Dexter, 
was purely original. He scorned imitation in every form. 

Here is a page from his Avonderful book. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 255 

THE PICKLE. 

FR03I HIE MUSEUM OF LORD TI3IOTHY DEXTER. 

Lord Dexter relates how he icas created Lord b>j the People, announces 
his intention of forming a Museum of great men, that shall be the wonder 
of the icorld, and shall confound his enemies. 

Ime the first Lord in tlie youuited States of A mercary Now 
of Newburyport it is tiie voise of tlie peopel and I cant Help it 
it and so Let it gone Now as I must be Lord there will f oiler 
many more Lords pretty soune for it dont hurt A Cat Nor the 
mouse Nor the son Nor the water Nor the p]are then gone on all 
is Easy Now bons broaken all is well all in Love Now I be gin to 
Lay the corner ston and the kee ston with grate Remembrence of 
my father Jorge Washington the grate herow 1 7 sentreys past 
before we found so good a father to his shiidren and Now gone to 
Rest Now to shoue my Love to my father and grate Caricters I 
will shoue the world one of the grate Wonders of the world in 15 
months if now man mourders me in Dors or out of Dors such A 
mouserum* on Earth will annonce O Lord thou knowest to be 
troue fourder hear me good Lord I am A goueing to Let or shii- 
dren know Now to see good Lord what has bin in the world gr-it 
wase back to owr forefathers Not old plimethf but stop to Addom 
& Eave to shoue 45 figures two Leged and four Leged because we 
Cant Done weel with our four Leged in the first plase they are 
our foude in the next plase to make out Dexters mouseum I wants 
4 Lions to defend thous grat and mistry men from East to wist 
from North to South which Now are at the plases Rased the Lam 
is not Readey in short meater if agreabel I forme a good and 

♦Museum. tPlyiiioi^th. 



256 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

peasabel government on my Land in Newburyport Compleat I 
taks 3 presedents hamsher govenor all to None york and the grate 
mister John Jay is one, that maks 2 in that state the king of grat 
britton mister pitt Rouf es king Cros over to f ranee Lones the 1 6 
and then the grate bonneparty the grate and there segnetoure 
Crow biddey — I Command pease and the gratest brotherly Love 
and Not fade be Linked to gether with that best of trone Love so 
as to govern all nasions on the fass of the gloub not to 

At the close of the second edition of this strange 
volume, Lord Dexter placed a whole page of commas, 
periods, wonder marks and question marks, saying, "'in 
my first edition the nowing ones complane that I put in no 
stops so here I put in A Nuf that they may pepper and solt 
it as they plese." 

No locality in our State is richer in legendary and his- 
torical lore than this beautiful old city of Newburyport. 
I wish there were time to tell you of them all ; l)ut some time, 
perhaps, you may find time to go there for yourself. There 
stands the old Whitcfield church, with its whispering gallery 
and the vaults in which lie the bones of Whitefield himself ; 
the old Garrison House, the birthplace of William Lloyd 
Garrison, our noble Anti-slavery leader; and so many 
more well preserved places of historical interest that it 
would take pages upon pages to tell you of them all. 

The Newburyport people have an innate love and 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 257 

reverence for the old; und for this reason, there is much 
more really to be seen there of real historical interest than 
in many other towns claimino: much more. The Newbury- 
port people value the grand old trees, the old mansion 
houses, the old homes in which illustrious people have 
lived ; and every pains is taken to keep them, as far as 
possible, as they were in early times. 

It would be well, indeed, if some other of our old 
Massachusetts towns would follow Newburyport's example, 
and rescue from the greed of land buyers and speculators 
the old land-marks that remind us of the early days of our 
brave old forefathers. 



The riches of the Commonwealth 

Are free, strong minds and hearts of health; 

And more to her than gold or grain 

The cunning hand and cultured brain. 

For well she keeps her ancient stock, 
The stubborn strength of Pilgrim Rock ; 
And still maintains, with miVler laws 
And clearer light, the good old cause I 



— J. G. Whittier 



258 



STOlilES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




ISRAEL PUTNAM. 



BIRTH-PLACE OF *' OLD PUT." 

Let us take a walk out upon the quiet, old Andover 
road — a mile out beyond the witch neighborhood. Do 
you see there where the Newburyport turnpike crosses the 
Andover, that large, high-roofed house? 

A part of it seems much older than the rest. The old 
part was the original house ; and it was there that 
Israel Putman, known in Revolutionary times as ''old 
Put," was born. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 259 

In the chamber in which he was born is the same old 
furniture, so rich and massive. 

"Old Put," you know, was noted for his energy, his 
daring, his prompt, decisive character. A sturdy, hardy 
old Puritan was he. You remember it is said he was at 
work ploughing in his field when he heard the sound of 
cannon in one of those first battles of the Revolution ; and 
that he coolly dropped the plough, hastened to the house, 
armed himself and went to the l^attle. Nor was he too 
late. Putnam never was too late. And this time he was 
there in the midst of the fight before the battle was more 
than underway. 

Putnam was a man of few words. With l^im, a thing 

either was or wasn't, and that was the end of it. One letter, 

written ])y him during the w^ar of the Revolution, tells the 

manner of man he was : 

Sir;— 

Nathan Palmer was to-day taken in my camp as a spy ; he is 
condemned as a spy ; he shall be hanged as a spy. 
P. S. Afternoon. He is hanged. 

Israel Putnam. 

I suppose Israel Putnam without the fox story would 
be like George Washington without the hatchet story. So 
here it is : 

It was in 1749 that Putnam moved from Salem to 



260 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Pomfret, a little town in Connecticut not far from Hartford. 
Here he purchased a large tract of land, and in his own 
energetic way began farming. But it was, for a long time, 
hard, up-hill work. There w^ere droughts in summer, 
destructive storms in harvest time, loss of cattle in winter, 
and, with all the rest, plundering of his harvests and sheep- 
folds. 

One night there were seventy sheep and kids killed 
and many more wounded. Now, this was done by a wolf 
which for years had infested the neighborhood. That it 
Avas the same w^olf was known by her tracks, one track 
being shorter than the other three, from having lost in a 
trap the toes of one of her feet. 

More than once had the farmers set out against her, but 
she w^as a wise old wolf and had every time escaped them. 

But when Putnam came into the neighborhood, the 
death knell for the thieving creature was struck. To be 
tormented year in and year out by one and the same wolf, 
was not Putnam's way at all. 

"See here," said he, to his neighbors, after this loss 
of seventy sheep and kids, "this has gone just far enough. 
Now I propose to stop work, give up everything and a^^e«c7 
— mind you, attend to the capturing of this wolf. Now, 
who of you will join me?" 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 261 

Putnam had a way of expressing himself among his 
fellow men that never failed to cany weight and conviction 
straight to the hearts of his hearers, no matter whether the 
subject was wolves, dead kids, or the Continental Congress. 

And so a campaign was planned against this common 
enemy, the wolf. Putnam and four other neighbors were 
to watch alternately, two at a time, night and day, till she 
was captured. 

They started forth with their bloodhounds, and 
followed her to the Connecticut river. Here they 
found, from the irregular tracks, that she had turned back 
towards the farms. On they followed, hour after hour, 
through the long night, until near noon on the following 
day, Avhen they drove her into her den. 

And now the people gathered with sticks and straw, 
and sulphur, guns, dogs, fire ; determined to put an 
end to her. 

First the blood-hounds were driven in ; but they 
returned, wounded and yelping with fright. Then the fire 
and burning sulphur were carried into the den ; but no 
wolf came, forth. Guns were fired into the den, but the 
wolf still lived ; for they could hear her moaning. 

Xow Putnam's temper was aroused. "She will escape 
us yet," said he, " by some underground passage that we 



262 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

do not know of. Here, give me the gun. If.no one else 
dares, I myself will attack her." 

And seizing a gun, he crawled into the cave under the 
rocks, carrying with him a gun, and a ])lazing torch. 

A long rope was tied around his Avaist by which he 
was t;) be pulled out of the den, if, perchance, he, instead 
of the wolf, should ]:>e killed in the attack. 

It was a strange cavern, dark and damp. The open- 
ing, only about two feet square, led for some little distance 
straight into the ledge ; then it descended into a dark 
underground space. 

Cautiously and slowly Putnam crawled along to this 
space. There, at the farthest corner of the den, he could 
see the two glaring eyes of the wolf. At the sight of the 
torch, she growled and gnashed her teeth. 

Putnam drew nearer and nearer. The ^volf srrow 

o 

fiercer and fiercer. She howled, rolled her eyes, curled 
herself up, and made ready to spring. Putnam levelled 
his gun and fired. Stunned l)y the noise, and suffocated by 
the smoke, he was glad enough to be dragged forth by the 
rope into the open air. 

Waiting only for the smoke to clear away, he entered 
again. There lay the wolf dead, the blood pouring from 
the o^un shot wound in the side. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 263 

Seizing her by the ears, Putnam gave the signal, and 
was dragged forth again from the cavern. 

Putnam, you may be sure, was henceforth the hero of 
the neighborhood ; and I am glad to say that from that 
time on, his fortunes seemed to change. His crops suc- 
ceeded, his stock w^ere unmolested, his orchards were 
fruitful, and success attended him on every hand. This same 
bravery and daring characterized his deeds in the wars that 
followed with the Indians, and in the war of the Revolution. 

It is said that Putnam, now General Putnam, w^as 
ploughing in his fields, when w^ord was brought him of the 
Battle of Lexington. "I must go to Boston," said he; 
and dropping his plough, he started without another word ; 
and long before the Battle of Bunker Hill, he was regularly 
established with his troops as a military officer. Such was 
the marvelous directness with wdiich he always moved. 
"If a thing is to be done, do it at once," was a favorite 
remark of his. 

After the w^ar, he retired to quiet life, ready, however, 
to come forth, if his country needed him, promptly, as had 
always been his habit. 

In 1790, he died. And his death the country mourned. 
Hardly greater tribute was paid to Washington himself, 
than to this brave man, Israel Putnam. 



264 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The funeral eulogy, pronounced iit his grave by Dr. 
Waldo, expresses well the profound love and respect with 
which, he was held in those days : 

" Those venerable relics ! once delighted in the endearing 
domestic virtues, which constitute the excellent neighbor — hus- 
band — parent — and worthy brother ! liberal and substantial in 
his friendship ; — unsuspicious — open — and generous ; — just 
and sincere in dealing; a benevolent citizen of the world — he 
concentrated in his bosom, the noble qualities of an honest man. 

"Born a hero — whom nature taught and cherished in the 
lap of innumerable toils and dangers, he was terrible in battle ! 
But, from the amiableness of his heart — when carnage cased, 
his humanity spread over the fields like the refreshing zephyrs of 
a summer's evening! — The prisoner — the wounded — the sick 
— the forlorn — experienced the delicate sympathy of this 
soldier's pillow — the poor, and the needy, of every descrip- 
tion, received tlie cliaritable bounties of this Ciikistian soldier. 

" He pitied littleness — loved goodness — admired greatness? 
and ever aspired to its glorious sununit ! The friend, the servant, 
and almost unparalleled lover of his country ; — worn with honor- 
able age, and the former toils of tear — Putnam ! ' Rests from his 
labors.' " 

" Till mouldering worlds and tumbling systems burst! 
When the last trump shall renovate his dust — 
Still ])y the mandate of eternal truth, 
His soul will flourish in immortal youth! " 

"This all who knew him, know; — this all who loved him, 
tell." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 265 



IPSWICH. 

Not a prettier village in all Massachusetts, I am sure. 
To ride into Ipswich in the summer time from the South 
Side, up the beautiful streets with the over-arching trees, 
past the green, past the church, over the river into "the 
town," — no visitor but will be charmed with the quiet old 
place. 

And into the town means into a little valley, on one 
side of which are very ordinary looking buildings, leading 
up an ordinary looking street to an ordinary looking depot. 
But on the other hill-side is the beautiful " church green," 
and beyond it, high up, shining through the trees, the little 
church itself. 

And there are legends about this church, ever and ever 
so many legends. And real witchy ones too. Do you see 
that great rock in front of the church on the green ? A^^ell, 
there is upon that rock, (and every inhabitant old and 
young will tell you the same story, therefore it must be 
true), a foot-print, — a large foot-print — just as plain as — 
as — well, as any foot-print hundreds of years old could 
be. There are the heel and the ball very plain ; and the 
toe^, there can be no doubt, were plain once ; l)ut the 



266 STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

rock is weather-worn- now, so you are forced to imagine the 
rest. 

But the way the foot-print came there is the strangest 
part of the story. There was, away back in the colonial 
times, a very stirring sort of a minister by the name of 
Whitetield — George Whitefield. 

He made a o:reat name for himself in Enofland, and 
then when he was "called " to Boston, you may be sure he 
was received with public demonstration. Indeed, some say 
he was met at the wharf l)y the son of the very governor 
himself, by a train of clergy and by all the wealthy 
inhal)itants. And when he attempted to preach, great 
throngs of people crowded close to hear him — or rather, 
perhaps I should say, to see him, for his voice and manner 
were such that one could hear him rods and rods away. 

Why, at one time, when he was to preach in the Old 
South, the church, the doorway, the side-walk, even the 
street were so packed with people, that he himself was 
obliged to go around to the back of the building and climb 
through a window, and so let himself into the chancel. 

Whitefield traveled from town to town and from 
village to village, preaching in his wonderful way. 

And now you will understand the story of the great 
foot-print on the rock in the church green at Ipswich. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 267 

Whitefield came there to preach. His Satanic 
Majesty, determined not to be driven from this church, 
seated himself astride the ridge-pole and folded tight his 
arms, as if to say, "1 move not." Yon have heard of 
people saying, ''There was noise enough to raise the roof." 
Now Whitefield was a mighty preacher. And it is sup- 
posed — though, of course, even Ipswich inhabitants, at 
this late day, could not ])e quite sure — that the roof was 
raised on this occasion, else why should His Satanic Majesty 
have leaped with a howl of terror from that church and 
have landed upon this rock on the green with such force as 
to leave the imprint of his foot upon it ? 

But let us leave the church green now and come up 
on that high ridge of land. Do you see the old burial- 
ground off to the left? That is a very old burial-ground, 
and there are some noted people buried there. 

But let us go up higher, to the very top of the lono- 
ridge. There is a surprise awaiting you. The ocean ! 
Indeed, shut in' by this ridge of high land, one forgets in 
the town that Ipswich is so close upon the coast. But 
there lies the great ocean before us. There, away off to 
the left, are the Isles of Shoals; there to the right, the 
"revolvino; liofht." 

But almost more beautiful still are these fields just 



268 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 269 

here at our feet. See that little path leading in there 
across the brook, under those dense trees. If you should 
follow it you would come out into a beautiful open place, 
where most beautiful pedate violets grow. And in the 
very midst stands a group of trees, and among them a grand 
old mountain ash. Visitors to the town are always taken 
here to see this little spot of ]:)eauty, hemmed in on 
every side by beautiful trees and sloping fields. "Over 
the hills," the people call it ; and some way, standing there 
in all its quiet and beauty, it seems, indeed, an " Over the 
Hills." 

And do 3^ou see that great patch of white away to the 
left? That is The Sands. It is believed to be the site of 
the original settlement of the Agawam Indians. A few 
years ago, before it became the fashion to search for them, 
hundreds of arrow-heads were found in the sands. 

Ipswich has more than its share of "historical houses." 
There is an old Winthrop House outside the town ; and 
in the town, on High Street, are great mansion houses, the 
timber for which Avas brought from England. At the 
South Side is the old Caldwell House, which has a 
Revolutionary story attached to it, and has had Revolu- 
tionary bullets in its sides, as Avell. 

There is the old Perkins House, more than two 



270 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

hundred years old. There is a story told of one of the 
very early Perkins' ancestors, that at one time he saved the 
town by running all the way from the shore to warn the 
people of the approach of hostile Indians. 

And they do say — though I have heard it claimed by 
other coast towns, too, — that in Ipswich was the first 
out-and-out rebellion against a " tax on tea." 

The old name for this town was Agawam, and it 
seems to me it is rather a matter of regret that that name 
was ever changed. 

But Ipswich is one of the legendary towns of New 
England. Some people, who like to slur at conservative 
towns, say of this town and its near neighbor, Newbury- 
port, that there is far too much in both of the spirit of 
" worship of ancestors." Perhaps ; but people Avho have no 
ancestors are apt to say such things, you know. 

One other point of interest — " Heart-Break Hill " — we 
must not forget to mention ; for there is a wonderful 
legend about an Indian maiden who spent long days and 
nights there watching for her lover, a ])rave young sailor, 
who had sailed away one sunny morning, comforting her 
with the assurance of his faithfulness and his s})eedy return. 
So this poor dusk Ariadne kept 

Her watch from the hill-top rugged and steep ; 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 271 

Slowly the empty moments crept 

While she studied the changing face of the deep, 

Fastening her eyes upon every speck 

That crossed the ocean within her ken ; 
Might not her lover be walking the deck. 

Surely and swiftly returning again? 

********* 

What was it to her though the Dawn should paint 

With delicate beauty skies and seas? 
But the sweet, sad sunset splendors faint 

Made her soul sick with memories. 

********* 

Like a slender statue carved of stone 

She sat, with hardly motion or breath ; 
She wept no tears, and she made no moan. 

But her love was stronger than life or death. 

He never came back ! Yet faithful still 

She watched from the hill-top her life away. 

And the townsfolk christened it Heartbreak Hill, 
And it bears the name to this very day. 

— Celia Thaxteb. 



272 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



RIVERS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

One of the reasons why Massachusetts is so beautiful 
a State to travel through, i>^, ])ecause here, there and every- 
where are windinof rivers, iilistenino^ in the sunliofht, or fair, 
still lakes hidden in the valleys, or merry little ])rooks 
singing along l)y the road-side and through the meadows, 
or tuml)lin<x over the rocks in their eao'erness and haste to 
join the larger streams. 

What would the country side be without this shining 
water? What would the lads and lassies do, if they could not 
take advantage of Jack Frost's icy breath to slip on their 
skates, the wings of the winter time, and lly away like the 
birds ? 

And think of Queen Summer ! Why, she would not be 
half so dear to us, if we could not sail our mimic ships, or 
row bravely away from the shores of lake or river to 
mysterious islands or fragrant lily-beds. 

But this is only half of the story to be told of the 
water ways of the Commonwealth, for we are al)Ove all a 
very l)usy, })ractical people, never forgetting what is 
called the "main chance," and always quite as nuich inter- 
ested in bread and butter as in the beauties of nature. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 273 

Now, the rivers of Massachusetts have had, and prob- 
ably always will have, a great deal to do with furnishing 
the clothes we wear and the goods things we eat. 

Think of the cities of Lowell and Lawrence and 
Haverhill and oh, so many others ! What helps to keep 
the machinery of the mills running, making work for 
thousands of mechanics as well as mill hands? 

Why, the water, of course. 

You all knew that? Yes, I am sure you did, for 
although steam is so largely used to facilitate manufactures, 
millions of dollars worth of goods are turned out every 
year from mills run by water power alone. 

Of all the many rivers in Massachusetts, the Connec- 
ticut is the largest. Coming from the far-away Appala- 
chian range, it passes through the western section of the 
State, watering the fertile valley which bears its name, 
and after its long journey of 400 miles from the moun- 
tains, it empties into Long Island Sound. 

In seasons when the river is very high, it frequently 
overflows its banks and covers the fields for miles. In 
some places the people prepare for this by protecting the 
meadows by dykes or levees, like those on the lower 
Mississippi. 

Not but what the overflow makes the land fertile ; still, 



274 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

if the water is allowed to stand too long it injures the seed 
in the ground, so that it will not come up as it should. 

In this State the Connecticut has a descent of more 
than 130 feet, and, at Holyoke, works have been con- 
structed, utilizing this force so successfully that it is said to 
be the greatest artificial water-power in the world. 

Although the Merrimac is a smaller river, it is quite 
as noted as the one we have been talking about, for the 
manufacturing interests on its banks are very great. 

Lowell alone takes 10,000-horse power from it to run 
its spindles, and the busy, thriving towns of Lawrence and 
Haverhill must have their share. 

But the Merrimac does not miss the force it spends 
in turnino^ the mill wheels, for it comes from the s^ranite 
regions of the White a^^J Franconia mountains ; and besides 
all the rivers and streams whicli How into it. Lake Winnepe- 
saukee acts as a huge storage reservoir to equalize the 
supply. 

Besides the Connecticut and Merrimac there are many 
other rivers of lesser note in our State. Among them may 
be mentioned the Concord, the Ipswich, the Charles, the 
Neponset and the Taunton, all of which supply valuable 
water-power and beautify the country through which they 
flow. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 275 



A GROUP OF MANUFACTURING CITIES. 

Our State has, with all its other best things, a goodly 
group of manufacturing centres. On the Merrimac are 
Lowell, Lawrence, Haverhill ; then, down Rhode Island- 
ward are Fall River, Taunton, and New Bedford, once a 
famous whaling port, and further to the west, are 
Worcester, Springfield, not to mention several smaller 
towns, all wide-awake, enterprising and growing. 

Lowell, you know, is often called "the City of 
Spindles," because of its immense lines of cotton factories. 
Lawrence, too, might well be given the same name, for 
certainly the cities are as much alike as twins. But Lowell 
happened to get it first. 

In the early days of Lowell there were some very 
remarkable young women working in the mills ; women 
who, to-day, stand as the great ivomen of our country. 

One of these famous Lowell factory girls was Lucy 
Larcom, whose sweet poems you children have no doubt 
read and recited many a time at school. This little band of 
girls that chanced to come together at this Lowell factory, 
were thous^htful and studious. There was no such thins^ 
as a college for girls in those days ; why, people would have 



276 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

as soon thouaht of flying to the moon as sending girls to 
college ! And so these brave young women studied on by 
themselves evenings, after factory hours. They started a 
little pai)er, which they called the '' Lowell Offering,'" and 
in thi-^ paper many of those now famous women wrote 
their first stories and their first poems. 

There is no such literary history connected with the 
mills of Lawrence, for Lawrence grew up at a later date, 
when the character of factories, in every respect, had become 
much changed. There Avas a time when a terril)le accident 
in one of the mills of Lawrence called that city into notice 
throughout the whole civilized world. The fall of the 
Pemberton Mill has been immortalized both in story and 
in verse, and is perhaps the one event in the history of 
Lawrence. 

Of that manufacturing city. Fall Eiver, although it is 
large and prosperous and important and full of interest to 
business men, I shall make very little mention simply for 
this reason: this is a book for school children, and school 
children want stories and history. Fall River hasn't lived 
long enough yet to have a "history," as we say ; it didn't 
happen to have a colonial existence ; so it has its history 
yet to make, which it will no doubt do. But let us read of 
such of our manufacturing cities as chance to have a bit of 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS, 



277 



history connected with them. Haverhill and Lynn, for 
example. Although these are in nowise more important 
than Fall River, yet they happen to be in those parts of 
Massachusetts first settled, and so had their share in the 
dangers and struggles of those colonial times. 




278 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



HAVERHILL. 

It isn't often a wealthy manufacturing city can boast 
also of a wealth of historic legend. But Haverhill, so 
beautifully situated upon the banks of the Merrimac river, 
has both. 

Once it had ship-yards ; again it had breweries, 
distilleries and tanneries ; but now, so the gazetteer says, 
"Haverhill is one of our leading cities in the manufacture 
of ])oots and shoes." 

And since boots and shoes are just l)oots and shoes 
all the world over, you will not object, I know, if I turn 
away from that picture of Haverhill which it presents in 
common with so many other cities, and ])roceed at once to 
the historic picture which is so entirely its very own. 

It was in 1640 that a little band of settlers came up 
the Merrimac and chose the present site of this city for 
their new home. Only a year later and there came to the 
settlement the Eev. John Ward — a rcmarka])le man, 
the colonists thought, for his times. He was learned and 
religious, a preacher and a teacher, a Master of Arts from 
the great University of Cambrid<2^e, En«:land. The 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 279 

colonists loved this good man and he loved his people. 
And when the time came for naming the new settlement, 
now a flourishing colony, what more natural than that out 
of love and courtesy to this good man, they should name it 
Haverhill, after Haverhill, England, the town where he 
was born? 

The very early days of this town were like those of 
every other. There was the Sunday worship ])eneath the 
great spreading trees, and by-and-by in the little bare, 
white meeting house. The drum or the trumpet called 
them together, and with prayer-book in one hand and the 
musket in the other they entered the church and sat 
demurely through the long sermon. 

Numerous Indian attacks were made upon the town, 
and its people bore its share of suffering. At one time, so 
persistent were the Indians in outrages upon this little 
band of people, that there seemed nothing to do but to 
abandon the settlement and flee for safety to some more 
strongly-fortified town. It was at this time that the attack 
upon the Dustin household w^as made. All Haverhill boys 
and girls know the story ; but perhaps if some boys and 
girls from other parts of the State should visit the present 
city of Haverhill, they would wonder what that monument 
upon the common means. So let us tell them. 



280 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

It was in the days of King William's War. This war, 
you will remember, was brought alK)ut through the trouble 
between Eno:land and France. When France declared war 
asfainst Enoland, the French colonies in America thouo'ht 
it a fitting thing to make war upon the E^nglish colonies in 
America. This was hard enough upon the little struggling 
colonies, but harder still when the French persuaded the 
Indians to join with them against the English ; for 
although the French leaders were skillful soldiers, they 
knew very little about the country, and w^ould have had 
serious times, indeed, making their way through the 
unbroken forests. With the help of the Indians they were 
able to carry out even their most cruel plans, and to 
destroy villages and settlements in all parts ot the adjacent 
country ; for the Indians were everywhere, and were always 
ready for plunder or murder. 

But we will not repeat the horrors of this war. You 
have read it elsewhere. You know how towns were 
ravaged, farm-houses attacked, the people slain or taken 
prisoners or burned alive. 

It was just at the close of this war that, one day 
without warning, the Indians, with a great yell, l)urst upon 
the village of Haverhill. 

From house to house they went, coming at last to the 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 281 

little home of the Dustin family. Mr. Dustin was at work 
in the fields ; and when he saw the flames rising from his 
roof, you may be sure he made all haste to rescue his 
family. But he could do little against the Indians, half- 
crazed as they were with excitement and savage joy at the 
success of the onslaught. 

Mrs. Dustin, a serving-maid, and the little week-old 
baby were taken prisoners, and hurried away. For long, 
long days, through the woods, over hills, through valleys, 
and across rivers, the ])risoners were marched, to an island 
in the Merrimac, near Concord, in New Hampshire. The 
little baby had been killed on the way, but Mrs. Dustin 
and her faithful servant were thrust into the wigwams and 
set to work as slaves for the families of their captors. 

They were terrible days that followed ; but Mrs. 
Dustin, a woman of courage and determination, never for 
a moment lost hope. " We shall escape and find our home 
yet," she would say again and again. And night and day 
she watched. 

There was a little white boy in the Indian camp, wdio 
had been stolen by the Indians from his home some few 
months before. 

"My boy," said Mrs. Dustin, "you and I must 
escape ; and you must help me. I want you to learn just 



282 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

how it is the Indians strike with their tonijihawks to kill with 
one quick blow. Watch, but be careful that you do not 
arouse the suspicion of the Indians." 

The boy knew only too well how careful he needed to 
be ; he knew, too, what his fate was only too sure to be if 
once the Indians suspected the intentions of their captives. 

But he was a wise boy and a l)rave boy. In time he 
learned the secret and carried it to Mrs. Dustin. 

One night the Indians lay in a half drunken stu[)or, 
following a day of revelry. " Now is our opportunity," 
said Mrs. Dustin ; and at midnight, when the night Avas 
still, and the Indians heavy Avith sleej), the three white 
captives stole forth, killed their captors, and fled to the 
river, and in canoes followed the course of the Merrimac, 
till, after long days and nights of danger, they came to the 
town of Haverhill. Imagine, if you can, the joy in her 
family and in the town over the brave Avoman's return. 
Drums Avere ])eaten, the farmers all stopi)ed Avork, the 
women forgot their baking and their spinning, and all 
assembled in the little church for a season of thanksgiving. 
It Avas a ha})py day in the Dustin family, all together once 
more, all except the little baby Avhom the Indians had slain ; 
and it Avas a gala day too in all the village. 

Another monument at Haverhill, — the Kolfe monu- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 2J83 

ment — commemomtes the Indian attack in 1707 upon 
Benjamin Rolfe, the pastor of the village at that time. 

The good man, it is said, sat reading in his library, 
when suddenly, without a moment's warning, the Indians 
were upon him. With war-whoops, yelling, and flourish- 
ingtheir bloody tomahawks, they surrounded the house. 
Hurrying to the door, the pastor tried to bolt it against 
the half-crazed Indians. But as well try to stay the 
torrents. With shouts and curses, they burst it open and 
fell ui)on the inmates. The pastor, his wife and one child 
were most brutally slain. Hagar, the serving-maid, with 
the other two children, fled to the cellar, and there, hiding 
beneath tubs and barrels, they escaped the fury of the 
murderers. 

These Indians, spurred on by French officers who 
were with them, went from the house of the pastor to the 
church upon the village green; and there, breaking in 
through windows and doors, they defaced the walls, 
destroyed the books, and did whatever other mischief 
their malice could suggest. 

There are many other stories of these cruel times. 
There were the two little boys, Joseph Whitman and Isaac 
Bradley (you see even little boys had, in these days, solid 
old-fashioned names !) who, having escaped from the 



284 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Indians, hid themselves in a hollow log, upon which their 
captors, tired out with the pursuit, sat to rest and plan 
tortures for the little fellows when again they should be 
captured. Then there was a Mrs. Swan who, Avhen an 
Indian burst in ui)on her and her little ones, drove a spit 
through his body, killing him upon the spot ; and there was 
a Hannah Bradley, who, when an Indian leered through the 
window at her working over her boiling soap kettle, and 
yelled — as only an Indian can yell — "Me have you 
now!" dashed the seething, bubbling soap full upon his 
face. 

But let us turn from these scenes of bloodshed. They 
were terrible ; and these men and women were brave souls ; 
but the stories are not enjoyable — too many of them. 

Of nothing in the years to come will Haverhill be 
more })roud than that it is the birthplace of John G. 
Whittier, our Quaker poet. 

It was here that Whittier lived his childhood — 
" the l)arefoot boy " of whom he has written ; it was here 
he went to school in the little red school-house which he 
has so tenderly described in " School Days." Perhaps 
he was 

"the little boy 

Her chiklisli fancy singled." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



285 



Perhaps it was to him with trembling voice, "as if a fault 
confessing," she said, 

" I'm sorry that I spelt the word ; 
I hate to go above you, 
Because," the brown eyes lower fell, 
" Because, you see, I love you." 

Be it as it may, the old house in which he was born 
still stands and is visited every year by hundreds of people 
who love the gentle poet, and hke to see the fields and the 
brook and the " Beeches " about which he has written. 

Every year the Haverhill children celebrate his birth- 
day ; and his friends and people who know him say that 
nothing })leases him more, nor touches his kind old heart 
more tenderly, than this yearly tribute to him from the 
school children of Haverhill. 




286 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



LYNN. 



Lynn, another of Massachusetts' manufacturing cities - 
is beautifully situated on the bay, midway between Salem 
and Boston. 

Lynn beach, a shining sandy shore, stretches away 
some two miles even to the Nahants — Big Nahant 
and Little Nahant — those sunny rocky islands, that 
lift themselves so contentedly from the waters of the bay, 
and to and from which, daily, through the long summer 
months, the steamers make their way. 

Lynn, the city itself, is not a beautiful city, excepting, 
perhaps, its suburbs ; but once it was a very picture for 
beauty, as it lay, so quiet and peaceful, looking out across 
its shining sands to the clear, blue waters beyond. It was 
a quiet, dreamy town, this noisy, bustling, business- 
crowded Lynn, that you and I know to-day. Its beaches 
were free ; its craggy cliffs stood out clear and strong, 
sometimes frowning darkly down u})on the sparkling 
waters, sometimes reflecting their sunshine and warmth in 
their old weather-beaten faces. And there were mines of 
beautiful porphyry, and forests, and woodland lakes, and 
rich valleys, and proud old pine-clad hills. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 287 

And as for legends, — not a town in the Common- 
wealth can compare with Lynn in its richness of legendary 
and historical lore ! 

One can hardly stretch his imagination away from the 
prosaic Lynn of to-day, the Lynn of boot and shoe fame 
and leather interest, to the Lynn of a century ago. 
These noisy, paved streets were once ])road, smiling fields. 
There, where thedmgy, smoky depot stands, its shrieking, 
screeching trains forever thundering through, were once 
rich forests ; up there upon those house-covered cliffs, 
the eagles built their nests, and the sea gulls laid 
their eggs. Ovei" across that dirty, nniddy street, the 
beavers built their dams, and the water was fresh and 
sweet. 

But all these changes have to come when a village 
becomes a town, and the town becomes a city. It is, I 
suppose, the law of numicipal growth. 

The Indian name of Lynn was 8augus — a word 
meaning long or extended — and probably given it because 
of its long extended beach. Nahant, too, is an Indian 
name and means two or hoin ; and it was always the Indian 
custom to speak of the two islands as "the Nahants." 

The larger of these Nahants is as beautiful a place as 
you can find along our coast. The steep clilfs, which rise 



288 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



from twenty to sixty feet tibove the tide, are of rare beauty 
in their rich coloring of white and green and blue and red, 
purple and gray and iron-black. And then there are 
wonderful caverns and grottoes ; and between them snug 
coves of white and silvery sand. 










PAUL REVERE BELL AT LYNN. 



Swallow's Cave, which you must enter only at low 
tide, has an entrance fourteen feet wide and twenty feet 
hio^h. The cave s^rows narrower and narrower as you go 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 289 

deeper in l)ene{ith the cliffs, but by-andhy, again it opens 
out into the sea. At hisfh tide how the water rushes 
through this cave, and how it thunders and ])ooms against 
the sides ! It is deafening ; and you will be glad, as the 
water rises, to hurry away. And there are legends, Indian 
legends, of the beautiful Yawata, the Indian maiden who 
came here to bathe ; legends of the Indian mothers, who, 
with their babes, fled here for safety; of the warriors who 
concealed themselves here, to watch their opportunity for 
attack upon their foes. 

Then there is L^ene's Grotto — a tall ai'ch it once was, 
beneath which one might sit and watch the ships far out 
upon the waters. But, alas, some ruthless hand has seized 
upon this grotto and carried away its rock for building- 
purposes. 

But there is Pulpit Rock — no one has yet seized upon 
that for building cellar walls. There it stands boldly out 
to the tide, some twenty feet high. From one point, 
it does indeed look like a great pulpit ; and those 
slanting strata of rock might well be taken for the })ulpit 
books. 

And do you see that cliff near by, forming a partial 
bridge across the gorge beneath it? That is called the 
Natural Bridge, 



290 STORIES OF MASSACFIUSETTS. 

Then there is the Cauldron Cliff, so named because of 
the hollow in the top into which the waters at high tide 
seethe and boil, and boil and bubble, a very giant, witch- 
cauldron indeed. 

And Castle Roch. See how straight and high it stands. 
The battlements and buttresses are as strongly outlined as 
those of any castle you and 1 might expect to find along the 
Rhine. And those deep openings, — do they not look like 
doors and windows and orchards? 

Nahant has, too, its Spouting Horn : — all 1)eaches have a 
Sj)0uting Horn, you know. This at Nahant is a winding 
fissure deep into the rock, passing into a cavern 
somewhere, far in beneath the rock. The w^ater, driven by 
the on-coming waves, rushes into the fissure, then upward 
into the cavern, when, with an explosion like a distant 
cannon, it throws up great sheets of foam and spray. 

But Lynn itself. There, too, are high hills and cliffs, 
which, in spite of the ever-jealous building corporations, 
have not lost all their beauty. High Rock, near the centre 
of the town, is an abrupt, clear cut cliff, a hundred and 
seventy feet high. 

And such a view from the top ! There at the east lies the 
little town of Swampscott. Beyond is Baker's Island with 
its lights. Farther away are the white towers of Marblehead ; 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



291 




292 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

and away off, as far as eye can reach, juts out the headland 
of Cape Ann. 

And there is a Lover's Leap, a mile from High Rock, 
in another part of the town. What town of any legendary 
importance, pray, but has a Lover's Leap? One would 
almost think leaping from precipices was the Indian lover's 
one delight. 

A mile west of this is Pine Hill. And not far from 
that a great cliff, from which, in 1807, a great mass of 
six tons' weight was torn away by lightning and thrown 
nearly two hundred feet. 

There are also a Sagamore Hill and a Pirates^ 
Den, each of which has its own Indian legend to relate. 

The story of the i)i rates' den, although like all such 
stories, it has come to be, as the years roll on, subject to 
great variation, is something like this : — Far up the river, 
close upon the limits of the present city, was a great 
cave, to which the pirates were accustomed to come at 
night to hide their ill-gotten treasures. 

In the little village was a beautiful maiden, whose 
lover belonged to the pirates' crew. At nightfall the 
maiden would steal away from her home, down the river, 
to meet her lover, shut off, as he was by his piratical trade, 
<Vom entering the village where honest, law-abiding citizens 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 293 

dwelt. But one nio-ht there came a dreadful thunder- 
storm. The very earth quaked ; the hills trembled ; and in 
the morning when the sun rose over the bay, it looked 
upon a scene of destruction round about the village. 

Great boulders had rolled down the mountain sides ; 
large trees were torn up by the roots and thrown across the 
roads ; and at the pirates' den no trace of the old cave was 
left. The bridge of rock that had formed its roof had 
fallen in ; at the mouth of the cave lay a great ])oulder ; 
and in and around all lay great heaps of soil, and broken 
rock, and branches of uptorn trees. 

On this night, too, the maiden disappeared from her 
home, nor could any trace of her ever after be found. The 
years rolled by ; the story of the storm and of the maiden 
was half forgotten ; until there came to the town a sooth- 
sayer, who bade the citizens search the cave. 

" Within, under the mass of fallen rock and soil," said 
the sooth-sayer J " is a chest of treasures — gold and silver 
and precious stuffs. And near by the chest, pointing with 
her right hand to it, stands embedded in the soil the petri- 
fied form of a young woman. Beside her upon the floor of 
the cave lie tlie now crumbling bones of her pirate lover. 
Search ye the cave ! Search ye the cave ! 

And the people of Lynn did search the cave — no, not 



294 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

quite that — but they began the search ; and from time to 
time for several years, workmen were sent to the cave to 
excavate. Had they persevered, who knows what they 
might liave found? But tliey did not persevere ; and tliere 
are in Lynn to-day people who still look with longing 
towards the legendary spot, wishing, half believing that 
perhaps the old revelation of the sooth-sayer may have 
been true. 

And speaking of sooth-say ers, reminds us of the old 
witch of Lynn, Moll Pitcher, who lived in a little, low, 
heavy-roofed house in the very heart of the town, and was 
said to have the gift of prophecy. You need not laugh ; 
it must have been so, for here is a proof, that I am sure no 
boy or girl rightly educated in reverence for the great men 
of our nation can gainsay. And the proof is this : that 
Washington himself, when stationed with his troops in 
Boston, used frequently to consult this witch ])efore moving 
against the enemy. Certainly you would not suspect 
Washington of any such folly as that of consulting, time 
after time, a prophet that could not prophesy. 

Of course not ; and yet the people .s^y (and do not people 
always know ?) that more than once, at dead of night, the 
great general's horse was seen to stop at the house of old 
Moll Pitcher, the witch of Lynn, while the rider entered 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



295 



the little narrow door to learn the secrets of the future and 
the workings of the British general's mind. 

But there came a time when all this Avas changed. 
Historical and legendary Saugus gave way to the busy, 
practical Lynn of to-day. Lynn, as the business world 
says, began to grow. And when a city begins to grow, 
that means houses and factories, and swarms upon 
swarms of busy people. All these Lynn soon had ; for 
Lynn people are alive to progress, audit soon became a city 
of importance. 

It grew fiist ; it grew wealthy, and became the centre 
of trade and manufactures. Churches were l>uilt, schools 
were organized, houses multiplied, and Lynn became a 
manufacturing city, noted, so the geographies say, "for its 
manufacture of boots and shoes, its fine harbor, and its 
commei'cial interests." 



296 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



LOWELL, THE CITY OF MAGIC. 

Once upon a time, infarEastern lands, Aladdin built a 
palace all in a night by the aid of a genie, whom he sum- 
moned by rubbing a wonderful lamp. The lamp was the 
Sfift of a i^reat ma2:ician ; the ojenie was the slave of the 
lamp ; and the palace was the most complete and beautiful 
building you ever dreamed of. 

So richly and artistically had the work been done, that 
in the morning, when it was noticed that one small space 
had been left unfinished, the king of the country could not 
find irems in his treasure house suflScient either in numbers 
or in beauty to complete it. 

Do you think such things never happen now-a-days? 
Ah, but they do. 

Read carefully and see if I do not tell you the truth. 

Once upon a time, then, not seventy years ago, several 
very wise men, who had built a mill upon the banks of the 
Charles River, decided that there would not ])e sufficient 
water power there for all the manufactories they meant to 
have. 

So they thought and thought, and wondered where they 
had better go to find the sort of place they needed. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 297 

It had already been suggested that they should secure 
the privilege of using a large canal at Pawtucket Falls, 
near Chelmsford. This canal extended from a })oint just 
above the Falls to the Concord River, near where it joined 
the Merrimac. 

Those who built it never intended it for manufacturing 
purposes ; their only idea was to make it possible for boats 
to pass around the Falls, and the large rafts of logs which 
were floated down the river every spring. 

Among the manufacturers wdio had heard of the canal, 
was a man who might truly be called another Aladdin, — a 
real modern one, too, possessed of a wonderful lamp, by 
means of wdiich he had at his beck and call not one slave, 
but very many. That lamp was his brain, and the little, 
every day rubbing of events and circumstances kept it 
busily at work making all sorts of useful plans, and show- 
ing its master how they could be carried out. 

Though many w^ent to look at the canal to see if it would 
answer the purpose, our modern Aladdin was the only one 
to see how much better it w^ould be if they could gain 
control, not only of this water power, but of the river 
itself. 

So he quietly went to work and at his own risk bought 
the necessary land on both sides ot* the Merrimac, wisely 



298 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

keeping his plan to himself; for if the farmers had known 
of it they would have asked exorbitant prices for all the 
acres they had to sell. 

The property thus purchased was afterwards extensively 
added to, and upon it was built the first mill on the 
river. 

When, in September 1823, the mill was finished, water 
was allowed to flow in, and the wheels were started; they 
went merrily round and round, as if to show that they, 
at least, were all ready for business. 

So were the owners ; and everyone went so heartily to 
work, that in this mill, which Aladdin's foresight had 
provided for, cloth was made and sold that same fall ; in 
fact, within less than two months. 

This was only the beginning of all the spinning and 
weaving by machinery which was to follow, and which has 
made Lowell what it is to-day. 

Now, there are ten millions of dollars invested in the 
manufacture of cotton into cloth, canvas and thread. 

Other Aladdins have used their lami)s to good pur- 
poses, as the result shows. 

One of them, Benjamin Shaw, came very near losing the 
credit and benefit of an invention, which his wisdom and 
genius had perfected. He had made a loom for manufac- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 299 

taring stockings, and, in order to call the attention of the 
public to it, had placed one on exhi])ition. 

Some scamp of an Englishman, for every nation has 
its scamps, thought to duplicate the loom in his own 
country, and patent it as if the invention had been his 
own. So when Mr. Shaw tried to secure his rights in 
England, he found much difficulty in doing so. 

Finally, the Lord Chancellor consented to the exhi- 
bition of the loom in his chambers at the Palace in 
Westminster, in order to compare it with the odds and 
ends and unorganized portions the opposing party had sent 
for inspection, in endeavoring to make good his claim. 

Their small size probably misled his lordship, as to 
the necessary weight and dimensions of such machinery. 

Now, the Shaw loom weighed about eight hundred 
pounds and occupied a floor space of several feet, and, as 
you can imagine, it was a very queer looking object to be 
carried into the palace and pushed and pulled up the 
famous "Peer's Staircase." 

When the men had managed to lift it almost to the 
top, wdio should come along but a rather important 
looking, and a very important feeling individual, called 
the chamberlain? 

"Stop right there!" he shouted, "What are you 



300 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

doing? You will spoil the whole building. Who are 
you, anyway? 

Mr. Shaw tried to explain matters, but without any 
success, for the poor chamberlain was too horrified to 
listen. 

It was finally decided that the loom should remain 
upon the stairs until the Lord Chancellor had looked at it, 
which he very graciously condescended to do without the 
usual formalities. 

He brought with him very many learned chancellors and 
solicitors in gowns and wigs, and they all looked very wise 
and kept very still, while Mr. Shaw showed them what 
Yankee wit and ingenuity had accomplished. 

The result was, that a patent was granted, which 
protected Mr. Shaw's rights in England so satisfactorily 
that he was afterwards enabled to dispose of them very 
advantageously to a company of British manufacturers. 

To just such enterprise and ability shown in this 
and in other directions, is due that marvellously rapid 
development, which has changed a little agricultural village 
into an important centre of industry. Not like the growth 
of cities in other lands, reaching slowly the foremost rank 
of superiority in manufactures. Ah, no ; rather like Alad- 
din's palace, not indeed completed in a night, but in years 



STOKIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



301 



SO quickly numbered that we may well call Lowell the City 
of Magic. 

Thousands of men, women and children call this place 
their home ; and thousands of them contribute their time 
and labor to the making of fabrics of use and beauty, to 
be sent to other lands, as well as to all parts of our own 
country. 

How many of the workers of to-day shall prove the 
Aladdins of to-morrow — possessors of gifts from a Great 
Magician, which shall work more wonders than did the 
storied lamps of old ? 

Even now, the brain of the city is extending its enter- 
prises in all directions, so that the products of its looms 
are attaining an enviable reputation. 

Think what will be accomplished before Lowell cele- 
brates its first centennial ! 




302 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

WORCESTER, THE HEART OF THE COMMONWEALTH. 

If I were to write a story about Boston and call that 
conservative old city the head of the commonwealth, I 
should not be very far wrong ; so now if I tell you al)out 
Worcester, and speak of its busy centre as the heart of the 
commonwealth, I shall be very nearly right, for, at onetime, 
at least, this shire town of the county which bears the same 
name was very nearly midway between the eastern and 
western border of our State. 

The western border then meant practically the Con- 
necticut river, for you will remember how the wars with 
the French and Indians made it more than dangerous, in 
fact almost impossible, for the settlers to make their 
homes any further west. 

The old trail which the pioneers followed led them 
through the centre of the State, and as after the first few 
years there was a good deal of traveling to and fro, some 
convenient stopping place, half way on the journey, came 
to be almost a necessity. This must have been the case ; 
otherwise the colonists would never have been so persevering 
in their attempts to build a town where the city now stands. 

Nobody seems to know whether there was anyone to 
say to them, "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 303 

Perhaps they knew enough to try again without being told. 
Probably they did, for, although the Indians literally made 
it too hot for them by burning their houses, the colonists 
made a second attempt six years later and succeeded in 
building quite a little village, which they called Worcester. 

But before long the Indians became so hostile that, in 
1702, all the settlers left the place except one obstinate man, 
who said he wouldn't run and he would stay. 

So he did stay, sure enough, for almost before he knew 
it a red skin took his scalp and went off with it, doubtless 
thinking what fools some white people are. 

After a dozen years had passed, colonists came once 
more to Worcester, and this time the settlement proved 
permanent ; for the men were young, and brave, and 
adventurous, and then, too, peace had been declared and 
the worst of the troubles with the Indians were over. 

Until the Revolution the little town grew but slowly. 
When it w^as as many as forty years old most of the houses 
were only log cabins, one story high ; some with windows 
of glass, but many with simply oiled paper. 

Among the people were several Scotch and Irish 
emigrants who were skilled mechanics, and for this reason 
valual)le members of the little community. As their man- 
ner of worship differed from that of the Puritans, they 



304 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

decided to have a church of their own ; l)ut when they 
attempted to build a meeting-house, the people, gathering 
together, tore the frame-work down. Just think what a 
silly piece of work that was ; for of course those who were 
interested in the new church, were justly indignant, and 
resented the interference with their plans by leaving the 
town altogether. So the Puritans lost the help of some 
very hand}^ workmen, just when they needed their practical 
knowledge the most. 

Of course nothing of that kind could happen now-a- 
days ; we have all grown so liberal and so willing for other 
people to differ from us if they want to. 

In 1731 Worcester County was incorporated, and 
because of its central location Worcester was made the 
county seat. County buildings were erected and the little 
town became more important than ever. Indeed l)y this 
time it was quite a large town. Old-fashioned coaches 
rumbled through its streets on their way to Springfield, 
Hartford, New York, Boston and Providence ; taverns 
were built to accommodate the travelers, who were often 
glad enough to stop over a night and rest their weary 
bodies, tired out Avith much jolting over rough roads. 
But, best of all, the country folk came from all the smaller 
villages round about to do their trading ; and if they 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 305 

carried away flour and molasses, and calico and hardware, 
they first left behind them eggs and butter and cheese, 
and all sorts of good things brought in from their gardens 
and fields. 

From the very first Worcester seems to have been 
particularly interested in two directions, — the one 
spiritual, the other temporal. 

The Puritans had a Meeting-House all to themselves, 
and we have seen what a time they made about letting 
any one else enjoy the same privilege. 

Before the Revolution they built quite a fine church 
which was called the Old South. On the top of its spire, 
then or afterwards, was placed a rooster, a very lively- 
looking bird which kept its high perch until a few years 
ago when the old church was torn down. If that rooster 
could only have spoken what stories it could have told ! 

The best of them would surely have been the news it 
heard announced from the church porch one memorable 
summer's day, when Isaiah Thomas read to the listening 
people the Declaration of Independence ; that being the 
first time that document was made public in Massachu- 
setts. In this connection, at least, the Old South Church will 
always be rememl)ered. For many years it was the only 
meeting-house in the town, but when the people commenced 



30G STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

to build more churches it seemed as if they would never 
stop. 

To-day we might almost call Worcester a city of 
churches, for there are more than sixty in all, representing 
almost every denomination you ever heard of. 

The other direction in which the town showed a great 
and growing interest was in its manufactures. 

These really commenced at the close of the Revolution, 
and after the first railway was completed it was astonishing 
how rapidly they developed. At the present day their 
name is legion, and millions and millions of dollars are 
invested in them. 

One of the largest industries is the making of looms 
for weaving carpets and all kinds of fancy woolen and 
cotton goods. It is said that there is no other place in 
the world where a greater variety of looms is constructed. 

Then there are the wire works, where the wire for 
some of the very first telegraph lines in this country was 
made, and where miles of metal fencing, weighing hundreds 
of tons, are manufactured every year. This fencing is used, 
not only in the East, but also very extensively in the West, 
where the farmers have so many acres under cultivation 
that they are glad enough to have some comparatively easy 
way of enclosino" them. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 307 

I have told you that the increase of manufactures was 
largely dependent upon the railroads ; for after iron horses 
were made to travel between Boston and Worcester, all 
sorts of freight could be carried back and forth, and before 
many years could be shipped north, south, east and west. 

Like the veins and arteries which carry blood to and 
from the great centre of circulation, so AYorcester, the 
heart of the Commonwealth, has its o-reat veins and arteries 
of commerce, in the shape of its many railroads, which afford 
swift and easy means of communication with other sections 
of the country. Every week day over ninety trains arrive 
and depart, and more than ten thousand passengers come 
and go with no confusion and but little noise. 

All this traffic by rail adds to the prosperity of the city ; 
and when, beside, its other sources of wealth, we remember 
its fine schools and university, we shall see how well fitted 
Worcester is to keep the reputation it has gained, and to 
make for itself a still more prominent place among the 
leading cities of Massachusetts. 



308 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



SPRINGFIELD AND THE UNITED STATES ARMORY. 

Of all the many towns bordering the banks of the 
Connecticut river, Springfield is the most important, and 
I had almost said the most beautiful, but that would not do 
at all, for the scenery all through this fertile valley is so 
lovely that we might go from one village to another, think- 
ing each more charming than the last. 

Very many years ago Mother Nature saw what possi- 
bilities of beauty lay hidden in the land near the riverside, 
and as soon as the long winter time, known as the glacial 
period, had passed, the good lady went busily to work. In 
place of the immense sheets of ice which had covered the 
hillsides, she planted forests of noble trees, and carpeted 
the unlovely valleys with luxuriant grasses and nodding 
flowers, till all the sheltered meadows grew as gay and 
lovely as fairyland. 

After hundreds of years had passed, the red men came 
to enjoy her handiwork, and because of their glowing 
accounts, some of the early settlers decided to make their 
homes in this section of the country, which is now known 
as Springfield. 

Here, only five years after the settlement of Boston 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 309 

the little village had its beginning. For the most part the 
Indians were friendly ; and, owing to the richness of the 
soil, abundant harvests made glad the hearts of the workers 
and oftered inducements for others to join them. 

Slowly but steadily their numbers increased, and the 
only serious hindrance to the prosperity of the town 
occurred in 1675, when hostile Indians, followers of Philip, 
chief of the Wampanoags, burned thirty-two houses and 
twenty-five barns. 

As this happened just as winter was approaching, the 
inhabitants were quite discouraged, and, indeed, came very 
near making new homes elsewhere ; but fortunately this 
plan was abandoned. 

A hundred years later, at the commencement of the 
Revolution, Springfield was a very busy place indeed. 
Powder and bullets and other military supplies for the 
Colonial forces were stored here, and workshops were 
built, in which the fire-arms were repaired. 

When General Washington visited the town in 1789, 
he saw the site which was afterwards selected for a national 
armory, and doubtless thought how suitable it would prove 
for such a purpose. Perhaps he suggested the plan which 
was adopted five years later, when, by act of Congress, the 
establishment of an arsenal was provided for. 



310 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

In 1795 the manufacture of small-arms was fairly com- 
menced, about forty men being employed. That first year 
they made two hundred and forty-five muskets, and very 
queer, old-fashioned guns they were, too, compared to the 
ingeniously constructed "breech-loaders" of to-day. 

During the next five years the United States was at 
peace, and more muskets were made than could be used by 
the government ; so some of them were sold to the Indians. 
But before long the red men wanted larger guns, and sent 
word, " Small gun no good ; big gun, big noise, big bullet ; 
no boy's gun for Indian." 

So the big guns, the King's and the Queen's Arm, were 
manufactured and became very popular, numbers of them 
being scattered through the States, and often auctioned off 
in large or small lots to eager buyers, to be sold again at a 
good profit. 

The first American gun was superior to any patterned 
after foreign models ; and since the great improvements 
which have been made during the past few years, our neigh- 
bors across the water have paid us the high compliment of 
copying our designs. 

Nearly all the buildings connected with the armory 
stand in the spacious grounds, comprising some fifty-seven 
acres, purchased by the government for this purpose. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 311 

Upon the top of the muin arsenal is a tower, and on a 
clear day one may obtain from it a fine view of the city, 
and may look l)eyond in all directions, — southward across 
the meadows and the woodland to the winding river ; and 
westward from fertile fields and nestling villages to the 
distant beauty of the Berkshire Hills. 

Within the arsenal itself are stacks upon stacks of arms, 
like regiments of infantry all ready to march. 

What an array they would make ! 

Fancy three hundred thousand of them marching down 
the street ! If such a thing were possible you might then 
perhaps realize how wonderful it is that so large a number 
can be stored in one building. 

During the last year ot the Rebellion, there was a time 
when one thousand guns were made every day, which of 
course meant that a very large force of skilled workmen 
must be employed. At the close of the war very many of 
them built homes for themselves near where their work had 
been, and this tended to increase the prosperity of all by 
furthering a constant growth and development. Since then 
the future of this leading city of our Commonwealth has 
been assured, and every year makes a steady advance in all 
directions. 



312 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



MOUNTAINS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

In the western part of the State are the beautiful Berk- 
shire Hills. They are a continuation of the Green Moun- 
tain range and have all the restful beauty of those moun- 
tains of Vermont. I am always glad, in the hurry and 
bustle of our Eastern cities and towns, to think of these 
beautiful hills in the western part of our State, standing 
there so beautiful and grand and still. 

Then, farther toward the middle part of the State are 
the single peaks, Mt. Tom, Mt. Holyoke, Mt. Wachusett. 

I wonder if there is anything in all nature so beautiful 
as a mountain. It is so brave and strong ; it towers so 
into the air above us ; it stands out so grandly against the 
sky. And then the view from the top ! The villages in 
the valley below ! The broad, green fields, and the rivers 
winding like silver ribbons among the trees and across the 
plains ! 

The two mountains, Mt. Tom and Mt. Holyoke, are 
not very high mountains. Their summits are not snow- 
topped, neither are their uplifted heads hidden among the 
clouds ; but they are such beautiful mountains ! 

I remember so well a visit to these mountains not 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 313 

many summers ago. Alighting at the odd little Mt. Tom 
station, we were told by the little wagon-driver, odder still 
than the station, "Now you can go up the Mt. Tom car- 
riage-road with me to Mt. Tom Hotel, or I can have you 
rowed across the river to the foot o' Mt. Holyoke ; then, 
somebody'll take you up in a basket to that hotel." 

Being carried up in a basket to a hotel sounded so very 
suggestive of produce carrying, our party decided to take 
the carriage- road for their first venture. We were not 
disappointed in the beauty, nor did we ever regret our 
choice. 

O, such a beautiful carriage-road ! As we passed into 
the deep shade of the sweet pines, a hush seemed to fall 
upon us. The very wheels of the heavy wagon grew quiet 
as they rolled along in the soft red soil of the mountain 
side. The road wound round and round, bending now to the 
right, now to the left, each bend revealing some new and 
beautiful view, some new, sweet spot of shady woodland. 

At last the " Eyrie House " was reached. We were 
glad to see it — but the ride had been so wonderfully sweet 
— not majestic to tire one with a sense of awe, not danger- 
ously steep to pique one with a little sense of fear ; but just 
sweet and restful, ofiering quiet welcome at every new and 
gentle winding. 



314 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

But the view from the top was beautiful, too. The 
pretty villages and towns lying so peacefully at its base ; 
the shining Connecticut winding here and there, forming 
"the yoke," which is so beautiful to look down upon, then 
gliding away until lost in the busy little town below. 

Mt. Holyoke, too, is beautiful — just as beautiful in 
its scenery and in its views as Mt. Tom. But " the carriage- 
road " of Mt. Tom — one never forgets that ! The novelty 
of being lifted higher and higher in the basket-car at Mt. 
Holyoke never compensates for the loss of the "carnage 
road of Mt. Tom." 



I stood upon the hills, where heaven's wide arch 
Was glorious with the sun's returning march, 
And woods were brightened, and soft gales 
Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales. 

******** 
If thou art worn and hard beset 
With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget. 
If thou wouldst read a lesson that will keep 
Thy heart from fainting, and thy soul from sleep. 
Go to the woods and hills ! No tears 
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears. 



•Longfellow. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 315 



THE HOOSAC TUNNEL. 

In the north-western part of Massachusetts, where the 
mountains try to stop one from going farther, there is a 
great hole cut through them, called the Hoosac Tunnel. 

It is probably the largest hole you ever saw ; not that 
it is so very wide, for its width is only twenty-six feet, nor 
so very high, for its height is nearly four feet less, but that 
it is so very long. When we speak of its length we must 
leave feet for miles ; for if you go west by the Fitchburg 
railroad you will be four miles and three-quarters further on 
your journey when you leave the tunnel than you were 
when you entered it. The tunnel is so often spoken of and 
is so well known, that the railroad line running through 
it is very frequently spoken of as the Hoosac Tunnel 
Route. 

Why should everyone take so much interest in a hole, 
even a big hole, through the mountains? It certainly isn't 
because of its beauty, for though the approach to the tunnel 
on either side is through a country unsurpassed in scenery 
by anything at least in other portions of Massachusetts , the 
tunnel itself impresses one as being a rather damp and dis- 
agreeable place, and dark, too, notwithstanding the twelve 



316 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

hundred or more electric lights which make it possible for 
trains to be run in safety. 

I think the reason why everybody knows about and is in- 
terested in the Hoosac Tunnel, is first because of its utility, 
and secondly because it is really so great a triumph of en- 
gineering skill. 

Before the tunnel was completed there were no direct 
means of communication with the West. The mountains 
were in the Avay ; and to go around or over them, or to 
take some other circuitous route meant a decided loss of 
time and money. 

Massachusetts is a great manufacturing State and its 
cities and towns are thriving business centres ; and, above 
all, the people are so wide-awake that they quickly realize 
the necessity of having the best possible facilities to further 
their trade with the rest of the country, especially so im- 
portant a section as the West. 

What is true to-day was true as early as 182G, when 
the first propostion was made for a tunnel through the 
Hoosac mountain. 

In 1855 the work was commenced, but the first at- 
tempts seem to have been made in a rather half-hearted way ; 
for the greatness of the undertakinsf was discourafi^ins^, and 
then, too, it Avas still an open question who should assume 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 317 

the responsibility and raise funds sufficient to carry out the 
plans. 

Between this year and 1862 several railroads were in- 
corporated and were to have received very substantial aid 
from the State, but the good people in the towns and vil- 
lages along the line could not be induced to subscribe very 
largely for the stock that was offered, and so the A'arious 
companies, one after another, failed to meet the conditions 
they had agreed upon with the State, which required them 
to raise a good round sum of money to begin with. 

The result was that, althouo^h the towns ofave a o^reat 
many thousands of dollars and the Commonwealth seconded 
their efforts, the work went on but slowly and sometimes 
not at all, and I don't know that it would ever have been fin- 
ished if, in 1862, the State had not assumed the whole con- 
trol and begun to push the work forward in good earnest. 

When the State has a piece of work to be done, it lets 
it out to contractors, and they are always eager to secure it 
because the money is pretty sure to be forthcoming. In 
this case it took quite a fortune. You and I cannot realize 
how so many dollars would look. Did I tell you how 
many? Well, more than eight millions and a half were 
spent from first to last in the making of the Hoosac Tun- 
nel ; and notwithstanding this great outlay and the use of 



318 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

powerful drills and other machinery adapted to the work, 
and the employment of large gangs of men, the tunnel was 
not completed until 1875 — twenty years after its com- 
mencement. 

It was not merely that cuttings had to be made from 
both the eastern and western sides of the mountain. In fact, 
the first part of the work was that of sinking a shaft from 
the summit to the proposed centre of the tunnel, and this 
was naturally called the central shaft, and hy means of it a 
very perfect system of ventilation was secured. 

When we remember the oreat labor of drillino^ so far 
through the solid rock, and all the obstacles that had to be 
overcome, is it not interesting to know how nearly the 
right direction was kept by the workmen on either side. For 
we are told that the two headings, as they were called, finally 
met ; so perfectly had the work l)een done that the variation 
between them on the ground plan was less than an inch. 

On April 5, 1875, the first freight train, consisting of 
twenty-two carloads of grain, passed through the tunnel ; 
and only a few months later, in October, a passenger train 
was sent by that line from Boston to Troy. 

The advantage of this new means of communication 
with the West was speedily felt, and even those who had 
the most faith in the extension of business that would result 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



319 



could hardly have foreseen to what an extent oar Common- 
wealth w^ould be enriched. Every year brings more of 
the products of the AVestern States to us, and sees our 
manufacturers in return filling large orders for their goods ; 
and, whether for business or pleasure, a constantly 
increasing number of people, traveling east or west, avail 
themselves of the direct route through the mountains 
which the Hoosac Tunnel secures to them. 




320 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



FORT MASSACHUSETTS. 

Have any of you ever been down the harbor? Of 
course I mean Boston Harbor. If you have, perhaps you 
have noticed the forts that guard it : Forts Independence, 
and Winthrop, and Warren. 

If you could go over them you would get a very good 
idea of what a modern fort is like, and perhaps you would 
think Massachusetts always built her forts just that way. 

But in the old Colonial days, when men, and women 
and children, too, had much to fear from both the French 
and the Indians, forts were built on quite a different plan, 
and proved fully as useful as those we have been 
speaking of. 

Now, it would seem as if the English and the French 
might have been glad to join in friendly efforts to settle this 
new country, and make for themselves peaceful homes and 
prosperous villages in what had been an unknown wilder- 
ness. But the French were not contented with the land 
they held in Canada and elsewhere, and so made Avar upon 
the English colonists, hoping to drive them from America 
and establish in their place their own colonial empire. 
And although there is a saying that all is fair in war, it 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 321 

certainly was not fair and right for the French, in order to 
accomplish this, to furnish the Indians with guns and 
ammunition and urge them to go on the war-path and attack 
the English settlers. At the same time, they promised them 
bounties for the scalps of defenceless women and children 
as well as men, and in France the records are still kept of 
how this blood-money was really paid. 

Ever since 1703, the colonists in the northern part of 
Massachusetts had suffered more or less from this warfare, 
and when in 1743 rumors of a new war reached them, they 
well understood all the horrors that were in store for them. 

In the north-western part of the State they were 
especially exposed, for the Indians, who liked so well to 
travel by water in their canoes, could come down that great 
water highway formed by the River St. Lawrence and 
Lake Champlain, and continue south until nearly opposite 
the valley of the Hoosac. Leaving their canoes at this 
point, and following the well-known trails through the 
forests, they could speedily reach the unprotected villages 
widely scattered through the fertile valleys. So, early in 
1744, the General Court ordered several forts to be built, 
and among them Fort Massachusetts. 

Forts in those days were of two kinds, — those built by 
the settlers with very little help from the authorities and 



322 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

kept largely under their own control, and those erected and 
garrisoned by the province. It is said that Fort Massachu- 
setts was the only province fort in Berkshire during the 
war of 1744, — called the Third Intercolonial, to distinguish 
it from other wars. With the exception of one or two forts 
on the sea-board, it was the most noted and important of 
any in the province. It stood on a spot which is now a 
beautiful meadow, on the south side of the road from 
North Adams to Williamstown, and about four miles east 
of the latter village . 

We can imagine how like beavers the men worked, 
driving firmly into the ground the hewn logs which formed 
the stockade surrounding the barracks, for they well knew 
to what an extent their own lives and those of the women 
and children depended on the character of the defences. 
In the north-west corner at least, if not in the others, 
was piled a mound of earth u[)()n which sharp-shooters and 
sentinels could be posted ; for constant watchfulness was 
necessary to prevent surprises. 

When the fort was finished. Captain Ephraim AVilliams 
was placed in command ; and not only of that fort, but also 
of eleven other posts forming a most important line of 
defence, though scattered over a a\ ide extent of territory 
very imperfectly supplied Avith roads. We shall want to 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 323 

know something about Captain Williams, not only because 
he was a Massachusetts boy and a Imive soldier, but l^ecause 
he gave his name to Williams town, and by his will left 
money to establish a free school, the beginning of what is 
now Williams College. It is just a century since the old 
West College was first opened to those who could " read 
English well," and though one must know a great deal 
more than that to enter Williams now, I doubt ifany of the 
present two hundred students are more anxious to learn 
and improve themselves, than the boys who first went there 
a hundred years ago. 

Of course Captain Williams could not know what a 
great success his plan was going to be, and indeed he was 
so busy going from one fort to another, and sending scouts 
in every direction that he did not even write it down in the 
form of a will until a brief interval of peace gave him an 
opportunity to attend to his own affairs. 

But before peace came there were many skirmishes 
with the Indians, and many lives lost on both sides. In 
1746, a party of French and Indians attacked Fort Massa- 
chusetts and, overcoming the small garrison stationed there, 
completely destroyed the fort and carried oft' all the stores 
they could find and the prisoners they had taken. But the 
colonists were not easily discouraged ; so when the General 



324 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

Court ordered the fort to be rebuilt in the winter of 1746-7, 
they took hold of the work with right good will, and 
built an even better fort, which stood for many years after 
the war was ended, and which Captain Williams defended 
with so much skill and bravery that he was raised to the 
rank of major, and then to that of colonel. 

In 1755, it became necessary to send an expedition 
against the French at Crown Point, and our friend the 
Captain, now Colonel Williams, with a regiment of picked 
men, joined the Army under General Johnson. 

A good commander can generally tell which of his 
officers are most surely to be relied upon. It is said that our 
greatest soldier. General Grant, was wonderfully keen in 
his selection of men who could successfully execute his 
orders. 

General Johnson must have thought Colonel Williams 
one of his best officers, for he put him in charge of a large 
detachment and sent him ahead in search of the enemy. 
Unfortunately they were surprised by an ambuscade, and 
at the first volley Colonel Williams fell, shot through the 
head. Before starting on this, for him, fatal expedition, he 
had by will secured to the future village of Williamstown 
the college I have told you about ; and it seems as if he 
must have found that section of the country where Fort 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 325 

Massachusetts stood especially beautiful, or he would not 
have wished it to bear his name. 

Near the rock where he fell, three miles from Caldwell, 
a marble monument stands, placed there by the graduates 
of Williams College, so that no one may forget the founder ; 
but on the now peaceful meadow, under the shadow of the 
hills and not far from that highest peak of all, where the 
snows of winter first appear and Imger longest, — " Grey- 
lock, cloud-girdled on his mountain throne," only a single 
elm tree marks the spot where the early colonists built 
and defended Fort Massachusetts. 






326 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



DESTRUCTION OF DEERFIELD. 

You will remember what a ruthless and bloody war 
that w^as which received the name of Queen Anne's ; and 
how the Indians, urged on hy the French, murdered men, 
w^omen and children, and kept the settlers in an almost 
constant state of alarm. One would think that in the 
exposed towns the colonists would always have been on 
the lookout for sudden attacks, but the story of Deerfield 
proves that men may grow^ so used to danger as to neglect 
to prepare for it. 

In 1703, the French in Canada planned to lay waste 
the whole English frontier; fortunately they only partially 
succeeded, though all the eastern settlements from Casco 
to Wells were destroyed. At this time, with the excep- 
tion of a few^ families at Northfield, Deerfield was ftirther 
north than any of the other towns, and so was particularly 
liable to be visited by the enemy. 

In the winter of 1704 the town had been palisaded 
and some twenty soldiers stationed there, but, strangely 
enough, they were not gathered together in one place, but 
were scattered about in different houses. 

February came and nothing had happened, and I sup- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 327 

pose the people thought that perhaps after all they need 
not have been so much alarmed. 

Little did they know that a party of some two hun- 
dred and fifty French and Indians had already left Mont- 
real for the valley of the Connecticut, and were traveling 
swiftly south by the way of Lake Champlain. Leaving 
the lake and advancing up Onion river, they passed over 
to the Connecticut, and, following this icy highway, soon 
reached Deerfield. 

Their spies were placed as near the town as possible, 
and cats do not watch for mice more closely than those 
redskins watched for an opportunity to attack the unsus- 
pecting settlers. Unfortunately their chance soon came. 

On that fatal night of the twenty-ninth of February, a 
watch had been set as usual and had patrolled the streets 
up to about two hours before daybreak ; then, being tired 
and cold, and thinking the town safe for that night, they 
went home and lay down to sleep. All was now quiet, and 
the Indians advanced softly to the palisades, easily passing 
them, for the snow^ had drifted high and its hard crust 
gave good footing to the enemy. Then, dividing into 
small parties, the Indians with loud whoops rushed to the 
different houses, and with axes and hatchets broke in the 
doors and vrindows. 



328 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The surprise was complete. Awakened from their 
sleep of fancied security, and hastily and imperfectly 
armed, men and women fought bravely, but the issue of 
the fio:ht was not doubtful. 

Before two hours had passed the town was practically 
destroyed ; forty-seven of its people had been killed and one 
hundred taken prisoners. 

After the French and Indians had packed up the pro- 
visions and everything else of value they could find, they 
set the houses on fire, and about an hour after sun-rise left 
the town with their prisoners and passed over the river to 
the foot of the mountains. 

Here the captives were deprived of their shoes and 
given moccasins to wear, in preparation for the journey of 
three hundred miles that lay before them. 

Before they got fairly on their way a small party of 
English came up with them, and a skirmish took place, in 
which the would-be rescuers were routed without much 
loss on either side. 

Then began the hardships of the march to Canada. 
It was bitterly cold ; many of the prisoners were but 
half-clad, and the women and little children had not the 
strength for so toilsome a journey. Fortunately the 
Indians carried most of the children, probably hoping that 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 329 

eventually large sums would be paid for their ransom. 
But no such help was given the feeble women , and many 
were killed and scalped by their cruel masters because 
they were unable to keep up with the party. 

Among those thus murdered was Mrs. Williams, the 
wife of Rev. John Williams, the Deerfield minister, who 
afterwards wrote a most graphic account of the destruction 
of the town and the captivity of the people. 

After twenty-live days of great privation and suffering 
they reached Chambly, and here the survivors were treated 
with considerable kindness, and in course of time many of 
them were ransomed. A few preferred to remain in Can- 
ada ; among them, Eunice Williams, the daughter of the 
clergyman, who married an Indian and adopted the Indian 
dress and customs. In 1706 her father and fifty-seven 
others were sent on from Quebec to Boston, where the 
people of one of the neighboring towns invited the good 
minister to become their pastor; but he refused, prefer- 
ring to return to the scene of his former labors. 

Here he was frequently visited by his daughter, but 
no persuasions could induce her to leave the Indians and 
make her home with him. For more than twenty years 
after his return, Mr. Williams ministered to the people 
with whom he had suffered so much. 



330 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The general prosperity of the settlement was largely 
increased by the addition of new families, and before their 
pastor died he had the satisfaction of seeing a new Deer- 
field standing on the very spot where years before the 
Indians had raided the town and so nearly destroyed it. 



Here the free spirit of mankind at length 
Throws its last fetters off ; and who shall place 
A limit to the giant's unchained strength, 
Or curb his swiftness in the forward race : 
Far, like the comet's way through infinite space, 
Stretches the long, untravelled path of light 
Into the depths of ages ; we may trace. 
Distant, the brightening glory of its flight. 
Till the receding rays are lost to human sight. 

— Wm. C. Bryant, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 331 

DEERFIELD'S DAUGHTER. 

Greenfield is Deerfield's daughter, for before its incor- 
poration in 1753 the land it occupies was set off from the 
mother town. The best of good feeling has always existed 
between them, and I think Deerfield must be very 
proud of this pretty, prosperous little town which 
once belonged to it, and which came into existence after 
the worst of the Indian troubles were over. 

Scattered bands of red-skins were, however, still rov- 
ing about the country, and, fearing an attack from them, 
the village worthies, gathered together at town meeting 
in 1754, voted to picket three houses "in this district 
forthwith." 

So the colonists surrounded them with a strong fence 
of timber set in the ground quite close together, each 
picket eight or nine feet high and well sharpened at the 
top. As these houses were the surest defence of the 
people, the little settlement grew up around them, and 
although the land near the village was improved, it was 
not until practically the close of the French and Indian 
wars that outlying farms began to be occupied. 

Fortunately there is no story of Indian warfare to be 
told about Greenfield, so sad and so true as that of the 



332 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

destruction of Deerfield. The Indians, however, had not 
entirely given up their hostile intentions, as was proved 
by a number of less important skirmishes, and it was still 
necessary for the men working in the fields to keep their 
guns close beside them, as the following story shows. 

Five of the settlers went out one day to work on a 
farm near the village. They carried their guns as usual, 
but on reaching the field placed them against a stack of 
flax, and working busily here and there were soon some 
distance away. 

It so happened that a party of Indians lay concealed 
near by, and of course no redskin on the war path could 
omit so favorable an opportunity for getting a few scalps. 
So they stole softly toward the white men, and getting 
between them and their guns, fired, though fortunately 
without effect. 

Deprived of their weapons, the only thing for the 
settlers to do was to run, and doubtless they stood not 
upon the order of their going. 

Two of them, Benjamin Hastings and John Graves, 
fled across the river and finally reached the Arms Farm. 
Hastings said that the ferns in the field were as high as 
his waist, and that he ran over the tops of them. If that 
was so, we certainly must give him credit for some re- 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 333 

markable running. We don't see anything equal to that 
now-a-clays, do we? But perhaps we should if the really 
wild Indians had not all gone long ago to the happy hunt- 
ing-grounds. 

After the close of the French and Indian wars we 
may think of the colonists as extending their farms, and 
building new homes upon them, and working with greater 
industr}^ and courage now that peace had been declared. 

But it was not all work and no play ; for, when the 
long winter evenings came, the men used to gather around 
the open fire-place in the village tavern and, snugly seated 
before the glowing logs, discuss the affairs of the town 
over their pipes and mugs of cider or flip, or tell famous 
stories of their success with rod or rifle. 

Here ruled Andrew Denio, landlord of the Greenfield 
tavern, known throughout the country-side as a man both 
wise and witty, though possessed of a rather peppery 
temper. 

One day a traveler stopped at his house and asked 
for a "small matter of bread and cheese," which was 
quickly placed before him. His host looked on as the 
stranger despatched slice after slice without apparently 
lessening his appetite. Finally Landlord Denio could 
keep quiet no longer, and exclaimed: "My good man, if 



334 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 




STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 335 

you will stop now, you are welcome, entirely welcome to 
what you have eaten ! " 

But Greenfield boasted of other and better public 
places than the tavern. There was the school-house, early 
built l)y the townspeople that the bo3^s and girls might 
learn reading, writing and arithmetic. They had no com- 
fortable desks and seats then, but sat on long benches 
made of slabs, with sticks for legs, and nothing for the 
children to rest their backs against when they grew tired. 
They had no black-])oards and ])ut very few text-l^ooks ; 
and the pupils were not arranged in classes, but one by 
one the older scholars would rise in their seats and say, 
"Please, sir, may I read?" Then, if the teacher was 
ready, he would hear two or three of them read what- 
ever had been selected. 

Woe betide the unlucky lad who did not know his 
lesson or played any pranks in school hours, for the rod 
was handy, and it was a time-honored custom to use it 
freely. 

While the children were in school or about the house, 
and the men at work in the fields or havins: a social chat at 
the tavern, the women were just as busily employed with 
their household duties, making the spinning wheels fly 
merrily or baking wonderful goodies in the generous brick 



336 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

ovens. What famous cooks and housewives our great 
great grandmothers were, knowing so well how to make 
the most of the resources they could command, and learn- 
ing so bravely how to do without many luxuries which to 
us now-a-days seem necessities ! To the women, quite as 
much as to the men, was due the fact that after months of 
hardship, anxiety and toil, success crowned their efforts. 

What did they consider as "success" in those first 
years in which Deerfield's daughter existed as an inde- 
pendent town ? 

I think you will find that success meant to them the 
securing of safe and comfortable homes. It was for this 
purpose that the colonists made their way through the 
almost trackless wilderness to the beautiful and fertile 
shores of the Connecticut. It was for this that so many 
little villages were formed throughout the colony ; villages 
that afterwards became the towns of our Commonwealth. 

And it was for the rights of the home-makers that in 
after years the shot was fired that was heard around the 
world. 

When that day came Deerfield's daughter was not 
found wanting, and I should like to tell you how well she 
played her part in that mighty struggle. However, we 
must not begin with revolutionary days now, for we shall 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



337 



not know where to stop ; but for the present, I wish you 
would remember how the people li\ 3d in Greenfield, 
because life there was so like to what it was at that 
time in many of the other villages in Massachusetts. 




338 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

THE GREAT ELM AT PITTSFIELD. 

Among the many famous trees of Massachusetts was 
the great elm on Pittsfield Common. 

"That is a beautiful elm, so straight, so strong," said 
the early settlers, as they cleared a place for their little 
settlement. "We will spare that tree, and it shall stand a 
land-mark for us." 

By-and-by a town grew up about this tree. "Let us 
maken green just here," said the people, "and let it be the 
centre of our little town, and let this l)eautiful, great elm 
be our sentinel." 

"Let us build our church near the elm," said the vil- 
lagers again, when, by-and-by the village had grown so 
large, it was necessary to have a place in which to meet 
for worship. 

"Our children shall grow to be as straight and true, 
and strong as the old elm," the mothers would proudly say. 

" See, I can climb the great elm," said the village boys. 

"Come, let us play beneath the elm," the girls would 
say ; " no place so shady as the green beneath the elm." 

And so, year after year, the tree grew to be more and 
more to the simple people who loved their little village, 
and watched so tenderly its growing up. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 339 

But there came a time when the quiet people grew 
ambitious. The little white church with its pretty white 
spire was not pretentious enough for them. " We want a 
large church, "said they — ^' a very large church, with towers 
and chapels and a great belfry." 

" And the great church must stand here upon the green 
— in the centre of the town," they added. 

" But the elm, the elm is in the way, the elm that in the 
very founding of our village was left standing by our fore- 
fathers to be a land-mark. " 

" Cut down the elm. there are trees enough, " growled 
the citizens, who cared little for tradition, still less for a 
mere tree. " Cut down the elm. " 

And so, though it was like cutting into the very hearts 
of the old men and women who loved the tree and had in 
their bal^yhood and childhood played ])eneath its great 
branches, the vote was carried and the tree was doomed. 

The morninsf came when the workmen were to fell the 
tree. Axes in hand they stood ready for their work — 
when lo, so the legend says, the leaves of the tree folded 
together, drooped, and there went through the boughs a 
whisper, which only the woodmen heard. There was a 
hush. And now a woman comes across the green. See, 
it is the lawyer's beautiful wife, dear old Mother Williams, 



340 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

the people call her. '' Brothers," said she, tenderly throw- 
ing one arm about the dear old tree, "spare the elm to us. 
We have grown into youth, on into manhood and woman- 
hood, some of us on into old age, l)eneath this tree. To us 
it is full of sweet memories. O spare the tree ! " 

Then the leaves moved again. A sound as of sighing 
went through the branches. Kind old Mother AY il Hams, 
so pale, so gentle, so beautiful in her soft, white cap and 
rich, old laces. How beautiful she looked as she leaned so 
tenderly against the strong, old tree 1 

The workmen looked into each other's faces. They 
were kind men, and there was in their hearts, rough men 
as they were, many a kind, tender thought. " We will not 
harm the tree," said they, and moved away. 

So the old elm Avas saved. A few days later Lawyer 
Williams himself came before the people, granting them a 
gift of land from his own estate — a beautiful, sightly spot, 
on which to build the new church. 

And so the elm grew on and on, loved and protected 
by the people, its pretty little legend cherished as a 
tender memory. And sad indeed were they when the old 
tree died. " We miss the tree," s;iid they; "but it lived 
its own life and we did not harm it." 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 341 



THE BALANCED ROCK. 

Berkshire County ! The Berkshire Hills ! Our Swit- 
zerland of beauty, our land of lakes and mountains, 
of flowers and streams and forests ! 

In the beautiful village of Pittsfield, not far from the 
little sparkling lake of Pontosuc, stands the '' balanced 
rock." It is a great block of white marble, tons and tons in 
weight, and standing just poised on a little rock beneath. 

One could overturn it with a push of one hand, you 
would think to see it. But there it is, as firm and strong 
in its perfect poise, as if its support were miles in breadth. 

And there is a story about this rock, a pretty little 
legend. Of course, geologists will smile at this legend ; 
and it is altogether likely, scientific as they are, that they 
vill say something about glaciers that some time, in 
dim ages past, moved down through the Housatonic Valley. 
But the Indians used to tell a diff'erent story, such a 
pretty story, and of course, the Indians knew. 

Their story is this : One day the brave Indian youths 
were at play, rock pitching. It was a clear, cool day ; the 
air was fresh and crisp, and the healthy, hearty youths, 
full of health and strength, were shouting and screaming 



342 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

and rLinniiio" ; just as, to-day, you ])oys shout and scream, 
and run in your game of base-ball. Now, these youths 
knew nothing of a '■ picked nine ; " and " innings " and 
" home stretches " were terms all unknown to them. But 
they could run, and scream, and shout, none the less, in 
their wild game of rock pitching. 

It wasn't much of a game, perhaps you who under- 
stand the mysteries of base-ball v/ill say : for the game AA^as 
merely this ; a roundish stone was set up on another stone, 
or, perhaps, upon an old tree trunk ; the youths in turn 
pitched rocks at this as a target ; each youth could try a 
certain num])er of times ; and he that sent the round stone 
toppling from its place to the ground was the hero, and 
won the game. 

Not much of a game to l)e sure ; ])ut it didn't take so 
much to amuse youths then, as now; perhaps because 
they were less wise, perhaps because they were wdser — 
who shall say? 

But you will wonder what all this has to do with the 
Balanced Rock out in the beautiful town of Pittsiield. 

Well, once upon a time, so the story goes, the Indian 
youths were at play, at their favorite game of rock-pitch- 
ing. Such pride as they did take in their strength ! And 
what contempt they had for physical weakness ! 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 343 

The strongest of the youths had just made a — not a 
"big catch" exactly, but a "great throw." How the 
forests echoed with their yells of triumph ! It was the 
chief's own son that had done this. How proud they were 
of their chief's strono' son. 

o 

Just then, there suddenly appeared in their midst a 
youth not half as tall as they, yet as old, a little, weak, 
half-grown, puny, — even a sickly looking lad. 

"See, see ! " cried the chiefs son, elated with his own 
victory and proud of his strength. "See, see the papoose 
come to play at rock throwing ! " 

"Ha, ha, ha ; Ugh ! ugh ! ugh !" laughed and grunted, 
in Indian fashion, the youths. "Papoose, papoose come 
to play with the chief's son ! " 

The youth did not notice a threatening gleam that 
came in the stranger's eye. They danced about him, 
yelled and howled, "Papoose, papoose come and play at 
rock-pitching ! " 

But, in a moment, all were still as death. They stood, 
mouths and eyes wide open — gazing terror stricken. For 
lo, the papoose l>egan to grow, taller and taller, larger 
and larger — till the chief's son looked like a mere pigmy 
by his side. 

"The papoose vnll play at rock-throwing," thundered 



344 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

he; "and he will play with the chief's son, yes, the 
chief's son, the strongest of all Indian youths. " Then 
he roared with scorn and laughter till the Indian youths, 
chief's son and all, quaked with fear. 

"Throw!" thundered he; and each youth in turn, 
trembling with fright, tried to throw. Such weak, weak 
throws. And the chief's son's throw was the weakest of them 
all. And how the giant roared with laughter. " The papoose 
will throw. See, now, how the papoose will thrown'' 
And, with one mighty summoning of all his strength, he 
dragged out from the earth, where ^ perhaps for centuries 
it had lain embedded, this great boulder, now called the 
balanced rock, and tossed it like a mere pebble at the 
target. It crushed and ground it to powder, as it struck 
full upon it. For a second it rocked and reeled ; then 
poising itself, as you see it now, it stood firm and strong, 
and still stands firm and strong, as any Pittsfield boy or 
girl can tell you. 

"The papoose can throw," said the giant, grimly — 
the Indians were not given to much talking — and then he 
walked away into the forests. 

What the Indian youths said among themselves is not 
recorded. Perhaps they said nothing, and went to their 
homes to think. 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 345 



LAKE ONOTA AND ITS LEGEND. 

Of the hundred lakes of Berkshire 

Fairest is the Lake Onota ; 
Nestled at the feet of mountaius 

Lies her mirror-like, pure water. 

Graceful are her shores in outline, 
As the droop of elm or willow ; 

Wonderful the bed she lies on ; 

Green the banks that make her pillow. 

And she lies there in the sunshine 
Sighing, lisping, singing, dreaming. 

All the trees that stand about her, 
All the hills and mountains, seeming, 

All the little flowers beside her. 
Watchfully to guard and love her ; 

The king-fisher darts beneath her. 
And the eagle soars above her. 

Sing a song to please the children, 

Lake Onota, Lake Onota, 
Tell some pretty Indian legend 

With thy softly lisping water. 



346 STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

The Legend. 

Long ago, before the white man 
Set his foot on yonder monntain, 

Came a snow-white doe to drink here 
Of my cool, refreshing fountain. 

Lithe was she as any sapling, 
Fair and graceful as a lily ; 

Up the mountain, through the woodland. 
O'er the pastures, bare and hilly. 

Swift she wandered ; but no red man 
Ever turned toward her an arrow : 

For — so ran the old tradition — 

That would bring the warrior sorrow. 

" While she lingers by Onota," 

Oft I heard the Indians telling, 

" Peace will tarry with the red man, 

And no plague come nigh his dwelling. 

So, for many years in Spring-time, 
When the bloom was on the cherry 

And the sweet air all about here 

With the wild bird's song was merry, 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 347 

Came the doe ; and unmolested 
Dwelt beside my cheering waters ; 
"We have seen her ! A good omen ! " 
Cried the Indian sons and daughters. 

But one sad day, from the Northland, 
Came Montalbert ; pledged to carry 

Some rare trophy from the woodland 
To his monarch ; long they tarry, 

The white hunter and his servants, 

They coax Wando into telling, 
Twixt strong draughts of fire-water. 

Where the famous deer is dwelling. 

Gleamed a rifle in the thicket ; 

Lo ! her deer blood stained my billows — 
Roared the oaks and pines with anger. 

Trembled all the elms and willows. 

Swift they bore her through the forest. 
While the breeze withheld his flinging 

Blossoms down upon my surface, 

And my wavelets ceased their singing. 



348 



STORIES OF MASSACHUSETTS. 

^' All is sorrow, sorrow, sorrow," 

Sang the wild bird, where she wandered ; 
" All is sorrow, sorrow, sorrow," 

Moaned the dark chief as he pondered 

On the sad things sure to happen 

With no white deer dwelling near him ; 
" Curse the pale face ! " cried the warrior, 
" We will neither spare nor fear him." 

But the Indians' numbers lessened, 

And their brave tribe drooped and faded, 

Till not one was left to wander 

In the old paths, still and shaded ; 

Till the white man dwelt beside me, 
And the white man's pretty daughter 

Came to play where Indian maidens 
Once had frolicked by Onota. 



AMERICAN ^ HISTORY ^ STORIES. 

By Mara L. Pratt, 

Author o/" Young FoWs Library of American History," etc. 
Vols. I., 11., HI., IV. 




USED IN THE SCHOOLS OF 

Massachusetts.— Brookline, Meclway, Maiden, Plainfleld, 

Clinton, Stoughton, Dedham. 
Connecticut.— New Haven, Hartford, Collinsville, Portland, 

Meriden, Bridgeport. . *,, x, 

Pennsylvania.— Harriaburg, Sharon, McKeesport, Allegheny, 

Mansfield, Pittsburg, etc. 
"Wisconsin.— Milwaukee, Madison, Broadhead. 
Ohio.— Springfield, Wooster. 

Illinois — Rock Island, Moline, Rockford, Peoria. 
Minnesota.— Minneapolis, St. Paul, Benson. 
Also in the schools of New York, Boston, Brooklyn, Etc. 



STORIES OF INDUSTRY. 

BY A. CHASE AND E. CLOW. 

Vols. I. and II. Fully Illustrated. Boards. 
Price, each, 40 cents. 




" These are in my opinion unsurpassed for the purpose of 
Supplementary reading and to impart a knowlege of modern 
mdustries. I have witnessed no effort so successful as this to 
combine the practice of reading and training in reading witli 
the getting of useful knowledge. I wish every school in our 
city was supplied with sets of these books, because they best 
realize the true aim of the work of Supplementary reading in 
mtermediate and lower grades." 

Wm. E. Anderson, 
Supt, Schools, Milwaukee, Wis. 



